Flash Fire
by Esquire 6
Summary: The Four Wings of Sand Island. Wardog. The Razgriz. Just a few names for a small group of Osea's greatest heroes. Now, after the declassification of the war documents, their leader has come forward to tell his story. The things you find within these pages may surprise you, they might even shock you. Welcome to the shattered skies. [Cancelled] [Slight AU]
1. Chapter 1

**AN/: Yup, I'm back. Long AN at the end. Don't want to keep you any longer from the story. Enjoy.**

* * *

 _Still Ghosts, All the Same_

Sand Island is a graveyard. Not for people. Not for machines.

Just for memories.

What used to be the frontline of hell, now sits silent, with only the calls of the gulls and the crashing of the waves to fill the air. No longer do the birds of prey, with their oily fangs, perch on the concrete runways. The earth desperately grabs and pulls at the man-made rock, splitting and breaking it with seemingly no effort.

Most people who fought in that war remember Sand Island as the nest of hope. Four Wings. Four Birds. Four Pilots.

But no one knows the story of those pilots. For them, Sand Island was purgatory. A stopping point between a rock and a hard place. Air Force careers went to die at Sand Island Air Force Base. If a pilot was lucky, they came here, trained, and left as quickly as they arrived. For those few who became stuck here, Sand Island was a curse.

So, one would be surprised that the famous 'Four Wings of Sand Island' even made it off the ground in those circumstances.

I had the fortune of meeting and speaking with those Four Wings. Over the course of a few months, four young hotshots became aces of legend. You'd never think those four would've ended up like that either.

Especially their flight lead.

He was cut from a different type of cloth. A breed of fighter pilot you only see once in a generation. No one gave him a second glance before the war. But he changed that very quickly. The Yuktobanians called him "Невидимый дракон", 'The Invisible Dragon'. Those who flew with him called him Blaze. But those who were lucky to share a moment with the man knew him as Ross.

Ross never felt that he should share his story. His modesty kept him from becoming a 'glory hound' like some pilots who were desperate for their moment in the spotlight for seemingly innocuous accomplishments. The fact this story is now on paper required months of persuasion and downright begging towards Ross. I know he'll feel embarrassed reading that last sentence, but I can't hide the truth.

The other side of Ross I learned about in transcribing his experiences was his commitment to detail and uncanny memory. Every flight and every day he could recall with a rather stunning level of accuracy, reminding me of things I had forgotten about when I had stayed on the base.

It doesn't surprise me too much, though.

Nevertheless, I don't want to detract from the man's own story with my monologue. All I hope for those of you who read on, if nothing else, is that you can understand and appreciate Ross' sacrifice and realize why those of us who saw and fought in the war with Yuktobania wish to never see another war again.

But, it's not my story. I'll let Ross tell it himself.

Heierlark Air Force Base is where the legend of the Four Wings began.

-Albert Genette, 2021

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Ch.1 The Angel With Broken Wings

"Rotating CAP positions, stand by."

"Affirmative Baseplate, all units currently standing by for immediate tasking."

"All combat air patrol units, rotate counter clockwise from current positions into the next available patrol area. There are two rotations left until personnel cycling at approximately 1145 hours. Carry on. Baseplate over and out."

 _If I had known this was what being a 'fighter pilot' was, I wouldn't have bothered signing up for it._

I sighed to myself as I rested my flight-helmeted head on my hand, slightly slouched to the left side of the cockpit of the T-50 training jet as it sailed along through the clear, cold northern skies at about 30,000 feet. Sure, getting to cruise around in supersonic jets was pretty exciting, and when we really got to let loose and do that, I loved every second of it. Everything else, on the other hand…

It might as well have been torture. The CAP routines we had been doing had been excruciatingly boring. We hadn't done any real maneuvering or scenario training for at least a week. Maybe even longer. It was driving me crazy.

"Yo Blaze," my patrol partner, Danny 'Echo' Graves, called over the horn, irritating me even more than I already was, "Why didn't you come to the party last night?"

"I was busy," I grumbled back.

"What?" This was the root of Echo's nickname. Danny could never hear anything over the horn to save his life, except perhaps on his hearing exams or on actual assignments. Every other time, I might have been more successful in trying to talk to a snake.

"I was busy practicing."

"Practicing what? You really like this shit that much?" Echo snorted, hoping some of the others on the training patrol cared even to join in.

They didn't.

"I was at the rink, dumbass. I was on the goddamn hockey team at the Academy, remember?" I replied, my tone weighed down with frustration, "I've told you this at least five times before, and you never can quite get it through your thick head, can you?"

"Hey, calm down man, no wonder they call you Blaze," Echo interjected before I continued my rant, "You're worse than Gopher."

"Oh shut the hell up, Echo," Gopher shot back from somewhere way out behind our 4 o'clock, "At least my senses actually work, dipshit."

Blaze. It was a name that had stuck to me ever since I was little kid. I was always a rabble-rouser, looking for or causing trouble constantly with seemingly no regard for my own well-being. I'm pretty sure I made my parents' lives into a nightmare, but they never said I did, even after I had mellowed out. Somewhat, at least. I also had the unique distinction of having a 'cold-war split' family. My father was Osean, former army special forces, and my mother was Yuktobanian, a former naval advisor who defected to Osea with my father's help during the Cold War. Most people in the service I knew had no idea of that. Only my superiors who had read my file knew, and none of them had cared a bit so far. But I just knew that would change.

In high school, I was extremely ostracized for my heritage. Growing up in northern Osea near former Belkan territory with 'annexed' citizens shoved in exasperated the issue even further. But, some of my best friends growing up were full-blooded Belkans, which most Osean kids berated even more than me. It definitely helped foster that fiery temper of mine. Once I got to the Air Force Academy though, that all ended. People let me be, I went and played hockey, and I had an ok time. Definitely much better than I could've predicted it going.

"Charlie 16, Charlie 16, this is Baseplate, come in, over."

 _What the hell are they bothering me for? Gotta report for another court martial?_

"Baseplate, this is Charlie 16, I'm receiving, go ahead, over."

"Charlie 16, you are excused from the rest of the patrol, the base commander wants you to report in to him, ASAP, do you copy, over?"

 _Huh. Wonder what this is going to be._

"Affirmative Baseplate, I copy. I'm on my way, over and out."

"Well, well," Echo started again, as I flexed my fists in anger, "Looks like you've been a bad boy, huh Blaze? Gonna have a little dressing down from the BC?"

"Well, I'm certainly not the one who got caught out past curfew, stone-faced drunk at some girl's house, am I, Echo?"

The horn lit up with everyone laughing at the pseudo-deaf pilot's expense, and Echo was reduced to a bunch of mumbling and grumbling as I broke out of the circle down towards what had been home for the past several months. Heierlark AFB. It was actually only an hour or so from where my parents lived and I grew up, so I felt right at home in the cold and the snow that everyone else complained about. The reason for most of the complaints was that the Bomber pilot training school was on the west coast, and the 'Big-Bird' school was on the southern coast, both in areas with extremely nice weather year-round. Getting stuck in the north with crappy weather, was sure to damage some egos, which I'm sure was the intention. Very few things are coincidental in the armed forces.

I made the approach and landing quickly since I didn't have anyone in the back seat, since solo-sorties had started about a month or so ago. It was nice actually being alone and having some space to think instead of some old-fossil yelling at you about every tiny little detail. I did pay attention to what they said at least. That couldn't be said for a lot of the others.

I rolled my T-50 in line with a row of more of the training jets, and the ground crew rushed out from the hangar behind the planes as soon as I shut down the engines. I helped them through the checklist for post-flight procedures, and once that was done, headed down the tarmac to the main building, flight helmet under my arm and a dark blue garrison cap on my head.

I headed inside the 'Hive' as the pilots called it to the Base Commander's office. The BC was a Colonel, a guy named Morgan 'Mad-dog' Steiner. Everyone pretty much called him Mad-dog, out of respect as a fairly successful combat pilot during the Belkan War. No one I knew had a single bad thing to say about Mad-dog. Tough, but fair was the best way of describing him.

One I got to his office, I stowed my cap in my flight suit's pocket, fiddled about with my dirty blonde hair, making the top, combed off to the side it needed to me, with the shaved sides having no way to resist my attempts at appearing presentable. I knocked on the door, and let myself in to the receiving room, with a receptionist that seemed to be a different person every time I came by. It was some dark-haired woman this time.

"I'm here to see the Colonel, ma'am. Lieutenant Ross Mitchell."

"Of course," she replied quickly, with a smile that seemed incredibly stiff and fake, "Right this way, Lieutenant."

I was led down a small hallway, my flight gear clanking awkwardly as we arrived at the door to Maddog's office. She knocked on the door and a deep voice immediately answered.

"Let him in, Captain."

She opened the door to the office, revealing that the Colonel wasn't the only superior who would be in on this meeting. While Mad-dog looked out the window behind his desk, his back to me, another guy was sitting in one of the two chairs that was facing the BC's desk. It was my instructor.

"Hey Blaze, long time no see, ey?" Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Butler's voice drawled in that patented south-eastern accent that he could never seem to shake off. Everyone who had the good fortune of being his student called him either 'Huggy Bear' or 'Papa Bear'. He had a knack for teaching pilots and seemed to always know the best way to get the most out of his trainees, no matter the issue. He was four inches shorter than me at about 5'6", and was no where near as bulked and muscled as I was. Despite the Bear nickname, he was rather thin, but that was a deceiving look. His short brown buzzed hair, and bright blue eyes showed no signs that he was reaching forty, rather than thirty.

"Good to see you, Papa," I smirked as we shared a quick handshake, and then stood at attention for the Colonel.

"Sir, Lieutenant Ross Mitchell, reporting in as ordered sir," I snapped my heels, saluting.

Colonel Steiner immediately turned around and returned my salute with a small smile, "I appreciate you keeping things professional with me. I know it can be annoying, but it'll keep you ready for when you leave this nest."

"No problem at all, sir," I responded, lowering my salute.

"Have a seat, Mitchell," Steiner motioned to the empty chair next to Papa, and I quickly took it, "Butler and I wanted to have a word with you about an opportunity that's just come up."

My dull green eyes widened immediately, and I was unable to suppress my surprise at this news.

"I know," Steiner continued, "Not exactly what you were expecting today, but it's something that Butler and I have discussed at length for a while, and we think you're just the person for this."

"Well, sir, what exactly is this 'opportunity'?" I asked, my curiosity raging madly.

"It's early graduation and posting to a frontline squadron," the Colonel answered plainly, "Of course, it won't be your final posting. It'll be your combat training with Wardog squadron, led by Captain Jack Bartlett. Only the best upcoming pilots get this posting. It's not quite the Naval Warfare Aggressor Training School, but it's definitely something on that level. You'll be ready for anything after you're through."

 _What?_

"I recommended you along with another trainee to get fast-tracked," Butler said, as he took over from the Colonel, "You'll just have to pass your check-rides and examinations early, and then we start some of the intensive dogfighting training here with the F-5s, so you're ready to hit the ground running at Sand Island with Bartlett. I don't want to give him any slouches to complain about. He's got enough on his plate to deal with."

 _I'm good enough for this? What sort of things do they see that I don't? There's no way I'm as good as they're making me out to be._

"So, what do you think, Mitchell?" Colonel Steiner asked, as he took a seat in his rather plain and simple office chair.

"I don't know what to say, sir," I replied after a few moments of silents, taking a moment to glance to both Steiner and Butler, "I'm astonished you think I'm as good as you say I am. I don't think I really deserve such an opportunity like this."

"Oh, come on Mitchell," Butler moaned, clearly unimpressed with my answer, "You never give yourself credit for anything. You deserve this spot. You've worked your ass off from day one in the Academy, and from day one when you got here. Despite what your disciplinary record suggests, you're one of the best pilots I've seen in a long, long time."

"Butler's right, Mitchell," Colonel Steiner continued, "You know your stuff, and you really do pay attention. Whether you realize it or not, you've incorporated your lessons into your flying at a rapid pace. Most of the others can't do that. They still need another month or two before they're barely ready for a real training assignment, let alone an actual squadron posting."

 _I guess…they're right. I have noticed that most of the others are stuck on things that I've moved past fairly quickly. At least I won't have to sit on my ass doing CAPs all day, every day anymore._

"Well, I don't think I can say no then, I think you both have convinced me, sir," I said with a shrug.

"Good," Mad-dog smirked, clearly pleased with my acceptance, "Butler will get you acquainted with the other trainee you'll be working on the fast-track for the next two weeks."

"Sir, if you don't mind asking, who is this trainee?"

"Oh, I hadn't realized I'd avoided that. It's Lieutenant Kei Nagase, callsign Edge. She'll be your wingman and partner from now on. I think you two will work well together."

—

Scuttlebutt had it that the enigmatic 'Edge' was quite the pilot. I hadn't had the pleasure of flying in combat scenarios against her, but from some of the others, like Gopher, had.

After the sorties of the day, he came back furious, throwing his gear off in a fit of anger. It took quite a bit of shouting back and forth to finally get something out of him about why he was so miffed. He went on and on about this pilot that his team had a three-to-one advantage against in a dogfight. Gopher and the others apparently had 'tried everything' to get the kill, but no matter what they did, this pilot danced around and shot all of them down. It didn't help that Gopher was incredibly hard on himself as it stood, and this incident drove him crazy. For a few days he refused to even speak to anyone except when ordered. But one day, Gopher returned to normal without any explanation. I figured that the pilot he went up against had a word with him and got him back to normal.

A lot of similar things had happened with pilots who had gone up against me, but I was a loudmouth and equally self-deprecating when I shot the breeze with them. So, for the most part they were fine with losing to me. But with Edge, the polar opposite was the case. I was very curious to find out what Nagase was like in person. I didn't know where to find her, but she knew where to find me.

I was having chow in the mess hall, on my own, since my schedule was sent out of wack due to my trip to the BC's office. The food was about the same as usual, mediocre. It was never good enough to make you happy, or bad enough to make you throw up on contact. That day, it was every soldier's favorite meal, SOS or Shit-on-a-Shingle. It was really creamed chipped beef on toast, but honestly I always got tired of eating it. About half-way through a plate my stomach was done with it, and I had to force the rest of it down.

After getting through about a quarter of the enjoyable portion of my SOS, Kei Nagase came walking in and sat down across from me, flight book in hand. She didn't say anything to me for a few moments as I finished chewing my mouthful, glaring up at her the whole time. She seemed a little flustered by my act, brushing a few strands of her ear-length black hair out of her face in response to my 'intimidation'. Nagase was bony as could be compared to me, so her reaction wasn't necessarily unwarranted, her dark brown eyes glaring silently.

"Now I know why Gopher was mad," I snarked, taking a sip of my bottle of off-brand neon-yellow sports drink.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Nagase responded.

"Oh come on, Ice Queen, you've really not figured that out yet?"

"Very funny," she sarcastically chuckled, "Is this your stand-up act?"

"It can be. I'll even do it for free, just for you. I can guarantee the quality will decrease dramatically as I continue to embarrass myself here," I shot back, cracking myself up a little. She seemed to take this better and she cracked a smile, one that appeared to be actually genuine. "Hey, there we go! I guess that means we can introduce ourselves politely now."

"I guess so," she laughed back, "I'm Kei Nagase, Kei or Edge is fine."

"Alright Kei, I'm Ross Mitchell, Ross is alright with me," I replied as I held out my hand, and she shook it quickly and firmly. "So," I continued, "I guess we're going to be suffering together for a little while, huh?"

"Yeah, you could definitely say that," Kei sighed. She rubbed her eyes and glanced off away towards nothing in particular. "Did you come through the Academy?"

"Mmm-hmmm," I answered with a mouthful of food, which I took a minute to swallow before I continued, "I took a year off after high-school before I started the grind to play with the under-20 national hockey team. I kinda did stuff on my own at the Academy since I was busy practicing with the team. Probably why you never saw me around, if you were there."

"That makes a lot a sense," Kei nodded, "You definitely have the look for a hockey player."

"I have the same about of brains as a typical hockey player too, don't you worry," I added with a chirp, pointing up to my head with an imaginary gun, "Got some grade A, genuine meat-head gray matter in here."

"That doesn't seem to be the case from what everyone says about your flying," she chuckled as she opened up her flight book and scribbled a few things inside.

"In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king," I rattled off instantly.

"I think you're selling yourself short."

"That's what everyone keeps saying to me."

"Well then, that means you might need to change your opinion."

"Hah, if I did that, I'd be off playing pro-hockey and being a rich, snotty asshole. I'm not doing that."

"Did a lot of your friends you played with go?"

That seems like such a long time ago. They seem like ghosts now, not people I thought were inseparable from my life.

"Some did, some didn't," I replied solemnly, resting my chin glumly in my left hand as I poked at my food with the other, "A lot of them changed when I met up with them at a reunion party not too long ago. I realized then that I had made the right choice in staying in. I wasn't the kind of person for that."

"I had a similar experience once, when I first went back home on leave. Everything just felt different, felt…wrong, you know?" she said, with a quick glance to the window and the clearing bright, blue sky, "It just…the whole thing gets more strange by the day."

"Amen to that." I went back to my main focus of trying to force myself to finish off my SOS. Eventually I did, while Kei busied herself with her own personal business in her books. She did ask the question at last, the one I knew was coming.

"So, how did you get the callsign Blaze? Is it one of those callsigns?"

I hesitated for a few moments, trying to gather my thoughts on how to explain this without coming across like a snob. "I guess it's part that. I've had that as a nickname ever since I was a little kid. My middle name is Ogonek, Yuke for 'Little Fire'. I just always had a major drive and sometimes a bad temper if I got set off. I 'earned' it in the force when a wise-guy took a crack at me in the hallway when he found out I was part Yuktobanian. He called me slew of things I really don't want to repeat. Without saying anything, I walked over and beat him up. No one has ever messed with me since. I wear that reprimand with pride."

"My family's from Proud Island, south of Usea, so I understand how you feel."

"Thanks Nagase, I don't know what it means coming from me, but that means a lot."

"Hey," she smiled, throwing up her hands, "That's what a wingman is supposed to do. Somebody needs to watch your back."

"Speaking of that," I said, slightly interrupted by a cough, "Do you want to work on some dogfighting sometime soon before we start the drills?"

She nodded firmly, "Absolutely. Once we are ready to go to the F-5s, just give me a shout."

"Where are you at?" I asked as she got up, "You're kinda a ghost around here, I have to say."

"Oh," she blushed slightly, "231 in the barracks, if you can't find me there, I'm probably in the lounge reading. Where are you mainly?"

"147," I answered back, "I can be kinda erratic, I'll be either at the gym or off-base at the rink, but I'll probably be out less since we have a short schedule now."

"Alright, I'll catch you around Ross," Kei replied with a wave as she walked off to wherever she was going.

"See ya," I said as got up and put away my dishes.

The whole rest of the day I had this odd-feeling of excitement in my gut, one that was similar to the one I had right before I would go out onto the ice at a hockey game.

 _Maybe I'm going to make it after all._

* * *

 **AN/: Hey everybody! Glad to see you all here. I know it's been a loooooooong time since I've posted anything at all on here, and I didn't keep my promises with The Man and the Eagle. Allow me a little bit of space to explain some things about what's been going on between my last update and now, which is quite a bit of time.**

 **I'm now almost at the end of the first part of my college career. I went through a pretty significant shift in focus over the past two years which has demanded a lot of my time and effort. Since I'm also planning on attending law school, I've been pretty busy keeping up with everything and working to make sure everything plays out as I would like it to. It's been a hell of a lot of work, but it looks likes it's going to pay off in spades.**

 **Also, I felt like after the first two chapters of the Man and the Eagle that something was wrong. It looked good but something was just not right. Something was missing from all of that. I couldn't keep on with a story that didn't have that spark, I guess I would call it. It took me until this summer to find it again. I had the incredible privilege to connect with some of my readers and cohorts, which was an amazing experience for me to mentor other writers or just be there to talk with them. All those experiences reignited my love for Ace Combat and why it's been such a joy to write about it at all. For those who I spoke to (you know who you are), thank you for letting me lend you a hand. It really helped me a lot more than you may realize.**

 **I also have been working on a 'side project' of sorts that I didn't post on this account because I felt that it was something that wasn't necessarily representative of the 'Karaya 1' moniker and what I'm known for. But, if you feel so inclined, "The Miracle of Berlin" by Der Graue, is that project. I have four chapters posted of it. It's really just a 'post as it comes to me' story, so there might be an occasional update there. If you do take a chance on it, I sincerely hope you enjoy it as well.**

 **Some of you old dogs, like me, may recognize a few similarities with this story to the old AC5 fic I posted one chapter of back in the day. I did carry over a few details, but I modified a lot of things significantly. I have a lot of big ideas planned for the story, new planes, new faces, and a whole new look into the Yuktobanian world during the war. It's going to be really fun and I can't wait to reveal it all to you. Please do not hesitate to let me know what you think so far. (I'm not really sure if this story will connect at all with the Hounds of War universe, but right now, I'm leaning towards no.)**

 **I'm kinda nervous and excited at the same time to be back on here after so long. It really is amazing that I'm getting close to four years on the site. And I hope there will be many more. Have a great morning/day/evening/night, wherever you are.**

 **Bis später,**

 **Esquire 6.**


	2. Chapter 2

**AN/: Yup. A 7,000 word plus chapter. Been a while since I've done one of those. Enjoy.**

 _"Rules are for the obedience of fools and the guidance of wise men."_

 _-Douglas Bader_

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Ch.2 Play God

Trisha?

Yeah, I got lucky with her.

We had been friends going back to when we were really small kids. Both of our dads were in the Army. Her dad wasn't a spook like mine though, but they still got along regardless. She was crazier than I was as a kid, which is really saying something honestly. The fact she hung around me for the most part probably helped that sort of attitude along. Pretty much a tomboy, picture in the dictionary and all.

But the good times were put on hiatus for a while. My father, Hayden, accepted a recall back into the special forces as an advisor/black-ops commander during the Belkan War in '95. We were forced to relocate away from the Belkan border from where I grew up at Volsten to Cranston, which was out in the middle of nowhere in the plains of western Osea. I promised Trisha I would come back, but I didn't know when. Seven years would be the final answer to that question.

To put it simply, that part of my life was hard. My dad got sucked back into that dark world that he desperately wanted to leave behind, but it was what he was good at. My mother, Anya, never talked much about it. We simply just spent a lot of time together. My mother was an unbelievably kind and gentle person. Just sitting out on the back porch in silence would fix problems for me. Every time I was around her I just felt calmer. And when she did speak, I listened.

She was the reason I got into hockey. Her brother, Pyotr, was a former professional player in Yuktobania, and he came for a summer when I was thirteen to teach me. That summer was one of the happiest of my entire life. We'd get up in the morning at six o'clock, go to rink, skate for twelve hours to the point I could barely stand or move my legs. I would skate with Pyotr and his ten-year old son Miroslav, or 'Miro', who was already signed to a youth academy for one of the professional teams in Cinigrad. I could tell then that Miro was going to be a star. When he skated, it was effortless. He could be all over you and gone within in a second. It also helped he was actually a good, nice kid too. I was amazed at the lessons Miro would drop on me when we would work together.

It would always start with a raised eyebrow at whatever I was struggling at.

"Still haven't figured it out yet, Ogo?"

"I can't do it, Miro, I can't do it."

"Sure," he would smirk back, "And that's what you said yesterday about being able to keep your balance in the turn. And the day before when you kept falling when you shot."

"Oh shut up," I would bark back, "This time I mean it."

"Yes, and I keep showing you that you're wrong, Ogo. Aren't you tired of telling yourself that you can't do things? Why don't you tell yourself that you can this time?"

We had similar conversations for the first part of the training, but it eventually went away as I starting catching up to Miro. The only thing I could never quite get him on was experience, but Miro had been on the ice since he was four. I wasn't going to win that battle.

Regardless, my summer with Miro and Pyotr changed my life forever. I was in love with the game, and I started competing that fall outside of school and found new friends. My life seemed like it was back in shape, despite all the hardship. But a few years passed by, then my dad dropped another bombshell.

We were moving back to Volsten. By that time, I had already finished my first year in high school, and pretty well entrenched. I had everything in order to just to have the house of cards sent tumbling down by a gust of wind. I was massively distraught. My friends were upset too. My last game with the recreational team was a hard one. It was a fun but sad night, leaving behind countless wonderful memories. I promised them I would see them in the big show when we were all in the pros.

And with that, Cranston was gone. To this day, I've only been back one time. I drove by the old house not too long ago just to see it again one last time. It looked just the same as it had the day we left. I remember the last night there, sleeping on the floor, terrified out of my mind of what was coming next.

When we got back, and moved into the old house we had left behind in Volsten, I had forgotten about the one person that had once been inseparable from me…

* * *

—August 29, 2002—

The first week of school had been like just all the others.

Worthless.

It was a bunch of sitting around going through class procedures and the dumb introductory games. A few of my old friends had been willing to reconnect with me, but the rest seemed distant. There were a ton of former Belkans at the school now and that had driven a lot of the students into factions of their own. The hockey team, which I had made the starting rotation with ease, seemed to be removed from that world, as the team was loaded with Oseans, Belkans, and even a few Ustians, and there was never any trouble.

Most of the first week with the team had been conditioning training and getting the newbies up to speed. Even though I hadn't been back long, I already had been handed an assistant Captaincy on the team by the coach, John Ward, a former minor-league player. He liked my attitude of helping the more inexperienced skaters with technique, and taking leadership in scrimmages. I couldn't really complain that much, but I felt like I was going to be under a lot of pressure to perform when the games did finally roll around in October.

It was about 4:45 in the afternoon when we had finished after-school practice and everyone was heading out to their cars to drive home to start the homework we all dreaded so much. But there was someone getting into their car next to mine who looked incredibly familiar, yet a stranger all the same. I figured that my guess was worth a shout.

"Trisha?" I yelled as I neared, startling a red-haired girl who had been placing her backpack in the backseat of her car.

As soon as she turned around and saw me, her expression changed instantly from confusion to a bright smile. "Ross, is that you?"

"Yeah, it's me!" I called back as I finally got up to our cars, "What are you doing around here so late in the afternoon?"

"Well, I'm in charge of the photography club. We just finished up our first meeting of the semester."

"Really? That's awesome!" I replied, as I was completely unable to control the massive smile on my face.

Trisha just smiled back at me, with her steely blue eyes staring right back up into mine. She was still as pale as ever, with her red hair tied back into a ponytail which went down a little bit below her shoulders. Even though she was a few inches shorter than me, she did have a way of imposing herself. She knew just how to say the right thing, at the right place, at the right time.

"How the hell are you back here?" Trisha blurted out to break the awkward silence, as her face grew more red in embarrassment.

Well...most of the time, at least.

"We literally moved back two weeks ago. My dad quit again."

"Oh, where did you guys end up before?"

"Cranston. Hell of a lot different than here."

"I can believe that," she replied happily, but then she looked to all of my bags and gear, and her face contorted, "What's uh…all that?"

"Oh, uh," I stuttered as I threw it all quickly into the back of my car, as she came over to look, "It's all my hockey gear."

"Hockey?"

"Yeah."

"Are you serious?"

"Yes…?"

"I should've figured. You'd fit right in with a sport that you can actually have a fist-fight to resolve problems," Trisha laughed. She placed a hand over her mouth to hide her laughter, albeit poorly, "It's so you."

"Well, you know me better than myself apparently," I chuckled as I slammed the trunk of my beater silver Belkan Dovi coupe. "You wanna grab a cup of coffee down the street? Probably a better place to catch up than out here in the parking lot."

"Oh, yeah. Sure, I'd love to," Trisha beamed as she gave me a quick hug, and I hugged back, "I'm glad you kept your promise."

"Well, I figured you'd probably find me and kill me if I didn't," I shot back. She quickly delivered a punch to my arm. Although it wasn't really that hard at all, I figured I'd play it up for laughs. "Gah, geez! Fine, fine. Let's go before you beat me to a pulp!"

She laughed rather hard at this, as she got into her car, "Yup, you're still the same."

"Why wouldn't I be?"

* * *

"Now that you both have passed your tests and certifications, along with your introduction to the F-5, it's time for the real test," Mad-dog said to the sparsely occupied briefing room, with only Kei and myself as the audience. "It's what we call 'Dynamo'."

The room's projector whirred to life behind us as a computer-generated image of Heierlark AFB and the surrounding area flashed up on the wall behind Mad-dog.

 _It's about time._

"This final examination will be a comprehensive test of everything that you've learned so far from all of your training, from the moment you first took the stick until right now. You're going to be experiencing a lot things that you'll feel if, and hopefully only if, you find yourself in an actual air war. So pay attention."

Both Kei and I readied our pens and notepads and gave a nod.

"Both of you, as of now, are officially sitting on alert status. You will be waiting for an air-raid scramble call which will come at some point over the course of the next four days. You should be prepared to get in the air at any moment from now until then. The call could come any of the days. If you're expecting any of us to be your adversaries, I'm sorry to disappoint you. For this test, instructors from other bases are flying the op to serve as independent evaluators on your readiness and flying skill. Your objective, is to ensure none of the enemy aircraft enter the attack range to launch a strike on our command and control center. Due to restrictions on our airspace and operating capacity, we're keeping that attack radius at about 25 miles out from here. You'll be given mostly unrestricted fighting capacity, but you'll probably have your hands too full to really think about it."

 _Well. Shit._

"Beyond that, I can't tell you much else. The last thing I can say is that the other pilots will be flying equivalent aircraft, so don't expect anything crazy on that front."

"So, no word on number then?" I asked, twirling my pen lazily in my right hand.

"Right. I honestly don't even know who they have picked for this assignment. You'll find out basically when I do. Bartlett can't because he's already been designated as your next commander, so I have some guesses, but I can't say anything else. Good luck, you two. You'll do fine, I'm sure, if your performances so far are any indication."

"Thank you, sir," Kei responded as we both packed up and left Mad-dog to put his files back together.

After a few moments, I glanced back to check our distance from the briefing room's doorway and felt satisfied enough to start talking.

"Well, this op is going to be rough," I sighed, scratching the back of my head, "I don't have a shadow of a doubt they're going to outnumber us, Kei."

"Yeah," she responded with a glance back towards me, "I'm going to be glad when this thing is over. They're going to really make us stew in our anxiety, if I had to bet anything on it."

"Well, we can at least make them pay for it when they get here," I smirked.

She chuckled at my comment, "Count me in."

* * *

As soon as Gopher, Echo, and the other trainees heard about our test, the betting pool began. A good amount of a pilot's life is spent sitting on the ground betting on outcomes. It's one of the few ways we hope to have some sort of control over the uncertainty of everything. We're wrong more often than not, but that's part of the experience. It's a good ego check for a lot of people, and that in itself, makes the whole thing worth its weight in gold.

That day, the first day, was barren of any sort of bets, but the other three days were rife with bets. Opinion was split on an early or late scramble time of day, some thought an early time would be easier to try and catch us asleep, but others thought a late time would be checking to see if we had been lulled into a false sense of security it wasn't going to happen that day after all. My personal bet was early morning on the third day. I couldn't really touch on why I thought it was like that, but for some reason it just stood out. Kei also bet on the third day, but she didn't decide on the time. She said that it didn't really matter to her what time it happened.

The first day passed uneventfully. I had decided to live in my flight gear for the next few days, and I kept my flight helmet on hand wherever I was at. I felt pretty determined to not only pass this test, but I really wanted to kick these instructors' asses. Kei and I didn't really talk much the following day. We just sat in our own corners of the pilots' lounge doing whatever. My luck had won me a letter that day. It was Trisha's monthly letter. I wrote to her a lot in my free-time, but since Heierlark was so close to home, I often called her a lot more than I wrote.

"Who's that from?" Kei asked, without a glance up from the tattered, red book she was reading and writing into.

"Oh," I responded, taken aback for a moment out of my focus, "It's from my girlfriend."

I didn't hear anything in response to that. It was really, really quiet. I looked up to see if Kei was looking at me, and as soon as I did, she immediately turned her attention back to her book.

"What? You didn't know?"

"I figured."

"You figured? What, you were hoping I wasn't taken, Nagase?"

She blushed slightly at that, "No, I wasn't."

"Sure, sure," I said, my voice making it rather apparent that I didn't believe her one bit.

But, for a few moments, I turned my attention back to Trisha's letter.

 _"Hey,_

 _Sorry I'm a little late with my letter. I got flooded with photography work this week and didn't have much time. I'm really happy that you're going to get your fighter slot, and early as well. You've been busting your ass these past few years, and it's about time those Chair Force idiots recognized it._

 _David came back in town the other day and was asking about you. He still wants to take you up on that offer for the Yuktobania trip. He says he can get everything in order pretty quickly if you still want to do it. He does own the whole travel agency, after all. I'd honestly would love to go over there with you when we both had some time off. It would be nice to go off and not worry about everything for a little while, at least. I would just hope David would be a good older brother while we are over there and not talk incessantly like he usually does. Probably too wishful of thinking though._

 _Not much has happened besides that. The little sis is still the same and John is his normal quiet self. It's a little weird thinking that only two of the six Walden kids are left in the house now._

 _I really do miss you. I'm going to miss you even more when you have to go even farther away from here. But, at least we can write, or talk when the stars align. Hopefully you can come back for a day before you leave. Cross your fingers for me, ok?_

 _Love,_

 _Trisha"_

As usual the letter was written on the back of one of her photographs. This one was a picture of the sky from one of Trisha's favorite spots where she could take pictures of all of us flying over Heierlark. It was in the late evening with a gorgeous orange sky and the contrails weaved a nice tapestry all over the sky. There was a little note written in the corner in black marker.

 _"I think I got you this time."_

 _Sure did._

* * *

As the third day began to dawn, I sat bolted upright in bed, waiting for the moment to happen. The Base PA system had a speaker in every room and when there was an announcement about to happen the speaker would click and crackle for a second or two. I knew as soon as that happened, the hunt was on.

I sat there for probably about half an hour when the fateful click and buzz came. I didn't wait. I took off sprinting as the air-raid siren played louder and louder as the seconds ticked on.

 _Guess who's winning the pool, you suckers…_

As soon as I was outside, I threw on my flight helmet and latched on the oxygen mask in a single, swift motion. Upon reaching my designated F-5, numbered 016, I vaulted up into the flight seat and roared through my pre-flight checks as I was fastened in and waited for the ground crew to double check everything. Kei was locked into her F-5 moments later, and she gave me a thumbs up as we both closed the canopies to our fighters. The ground crew eventually were satisfied with what they saw and gave us signals to start up. I ignited both of the Tiger's jets, which shook and roared to life.

 _God, I love that sound._

With the chocks removed, both of our Tigers began moving down towards the taxiway to begin our takeoff procedures.

"Tower, this is Charlie 16, callsign Blaze, with Charlie 5, callsign Edge, following, we are requesting permission for immediate taxi and takeoff, runway 27, highest priority, over," I called out over the radio, as I did one last check on my radar systems and electronics.

"Roger Charlie 16, you and Charlie 5, are cleared for immediate taxi and takeoff, priority Alpha, the sky is yours, over."

"10-4, moving into position runway 27, over."

"Copy, 16."

The Tiger clunked down the taxiway to the runway, the wait to take to the skies finally over.

"Charlie element, in position, taking off, over."

"Roger Charlie lead, good luck, over and out."

 _Time to dance._

I throttled up the Tiger to close to max thrust, engaging the afterburners and shunting the small fighter forward. The noise of the wheels increased more and more as my speed increased, and eventually, only a slight tug back on the stick sent me screaming up into the air and ended the sound. I retracted my landing gear, and held up for a moment so Edge could form up on my left wing.

"Alright Baseplate, this is Blaze, ready to go."

"This is Edge, I'm ready."

"Affirmative, Blaze, Edge. Targets are now on radar scope, approaching from vector 205, due southwest. Can you confirm?"

"Roger Baseplate, I can confirm," I replied as four blips flashed up on my radar. The IFF quickly identified them as our bogies. "We are inbound to intercept."

"Roger Blaze, you both are cleared to engage and destroy the targets by any means necessary. Hard deck is angels 5. Good luck."

"Thanks Baseplate," I responded nonchalantly as I banked to the left to the intercept vector, "Ok Edge. Go green for weapons, and stay on my tail. The only way we're winning this fight is if we stick together."

"Roger Blaze, lead the way."

"Alright, let's see if these old-timers can still play."

Our F-5s accelerated into a muted climb up to about angels 40, and after we leveled off at that altitude, Edge and I opened the space between us up by a couple of wing-lengths to keep our visual coverage unobstructed. As much as radar is a nice crutch to lean on, eyeballing targets usually worked wonders in maintaining surprise and the initiative in combat.

 _I hope to God that those four aren't higher than us._

I busied myself with scanning the horizon, above and below, for small glints of light reflecting off the approaching aircraft.

Although the possibility of the aggressors being at an altitude advantage, what I was rather glad about is that they had already made their job a lot harder in choosing their attack vector. Coming in from the west at dawn doesn't really do you many favors, especially the fact that the sun was going to be in your face, and that gave them no advantage on the first strike while we were masked slightly by the sun.

I checked the radar again and noticed the formation had changed vector to be on direct intercept course for Edge and I, rather than the base.

 _Well, that's objective number one complete._

"Edge, I'm going inverted."

"Roger that, I'm moving above, keep the stick level, over."

"I'll do my best."

I rolled the aircraft onto its belly as Edge closed in off my right wing, slightly above my aircraft. We had practiced this method of target spotting during some of our sorties with others in the training squadron who had volunteered as bait. I liked riding inverted in this spot better for some indiscernible reason, since I found it naturally easier to spot targets below us. And about a minute later, I caught a flash of light at my eleven o'clock maybe a thousand or two feet below me. I cross-checked the flash with the radar and the position seemed right.

"Tally-ho on our bandits, Edge. Eleven o'clock low. What's the closing speed, Baseplate?" I called, flipping my helmet's visor down.

"About 520 knots, radar signatures suggest four F-4s in tight formation," the controller responded.

"Roger," I responded, "This is Blaze, I'm engaging."

"Edge, engaging."

I throttled up onto afterburner once I rolled back to upright flight, pitching the Tiger II into a sweeping yo-yo turn, to hopefully rotate us around behind the attacking fighters, or at the very least, force them to overshoot on their attack.

"Keep me posted on the radar Edge, let me know as soon as they break vector."

"Wilco."

We kept going through the turn for a couple more seconds before Edge called out.

"They've broken vector. Looks like they were in a finger-four formation and are turning as a group."

"Roger, let's dance."

The four Phantoms were very clear now off over my left shoulder, coming in pretty damn fast, and looking like they were going to overshoot as I planned. I took this opportunity to improvise a little.

"Follow my lead Edge, I'm going to ditch the playbook, over."

"Roger."

I pitched my Tiger left and pulled back hard on the stick into a sharp, level turn. One of the Phantoms was already trying to correct into a turn of its own to try and get a shot off, but he'd taken too much speed and blasted way past our tails. The tailing two Phantoms of the group were square in our sights.

"Charlie 16, fox 2!" I yelled, releasing an imaginary missile into the computer for it to track after the real world Phantom. Both of the trailing aggressors split in opposite vertical directions at my missile launch. Although the missile missed, forcing movement definitely was better than nothing at all.

"Alright, I'm going after the higher one."

"Roger, I'm breaking off," Edge radioed and dropped below me within only a second.

I climbed after the running Phantom, knowing full well he was trying to drag me back in the direction of the other aggressors who had overshot earlier. I went into a Immelmann turn, rolling and ascending right back onto the Phantom's tail. I accelerated to close the distance to try and make a guns kill which was just a 'bang-bang' call.

One of the Phantoms from the element that overshot didn't afford me enough time to make the call, as he came in from my two o'clock high, and I was forced to dive towards and under his attack to barely miss him.

 _Shit._

I was breathing hard already. My hands felt like they were frozen solid, unable to release from the sticks. My adrenaline started to fuel my brain more and more, starting a fury at the Phantom who forced me to break off my attack.

 _You know what? That bastard is mine._

I slammed the stick back as I saw my original target blow past under me uselessly. I made another Immelmann turn to put me a couple thousand feet away from the Phantom, as he moved right-to-left in front me. I made a rather reckless move of barreling in a full speed, going straight for the nose of the fighter. The gun sight switched on and I lined up my reticle with the estimated 'kill-shot' as I closed in.

"Bang-Bang, you're dead!" I shouted as I blew under the defeated Phantom by about fifty feet, "That's one kill for me."

"What the hell! Watch it!" the pilot shouted, more angry about me buzzing him than actually losing.

"Take your own advice, sir," I growled back, already searching for my next victim.

"Good kill, good kill," Baseplate reported nonchalantly, "Continue the attack, Charlie 16."

The other Phantom was trailing me, but riding a bit behind since he was not as bold as I was about buzzing another fighter that close in a training mission. I, however, used this hesitation against him. I went to full-throttle, hurtling into a long, tight horizontal loop. A Phantom is not great as a turning dogfighter due to its weight and design. I wasn't going to play a boom-and-zoom contest with an experienced pilot. I knew I had to draw them into the fight I wanted. Luckily for me, an F-5 is still pretty damn fast for what it is. By the time I was halfway through a full circle, the trailing Phantom was struggling to keep up and losing visual contact. I increased my altitude by about a thousand feet, and once I put the sun at my back, I threw the Tiger straight towards the clueless Phantom. I came at him inverted at a high angle dive, locking him up for my missiles and getting a clear tone right as I made my pass.

"Blaze, Fox 2! You're wasted!". I rolled and hurtled back up to about 40,000 feet as I checked the radar for the other two Phantoms and Edge.

"Roger, Good kill, Charlie 16," Baseplate interrupted again, "Two to go."

After about 30 seconds I found the other bogies, one was trailing Edge, and the other found itself desperately trying to escape Edge's pursuit. I slowed into a deep Split-S, taking my time to line myself up directly behind and above the three dancing fighters. I switched over to my invisible long range missiles and activated the targeting. After a few moments, I got a good tone for both the Phantoms.

"Fox 3! Fox 3! Missiles away!" I radioed as I closed the gap to the Phantom chasing Edge which broke quickly to prevent his laziness from costing him his virtual 'life'. "Edge, your six should be clear. Let's get these guys and go home."

"10-4. Thanks."

I accelerated back into another climb, chasing the Phantom in the opposite direction from Edge back towards Heierlark. A quick mental check on range to the base put us at about 35 miles and closing. This guy was going to finally play to his strengths, and I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to win at this game.

"Fox 3!" I called, hoping and praying this attack would do something at all.

"Cobra 4, flares deployed," another voice called out on the comms.

 _Damn it!_

Growing more frustrated by the passing seconds and precious miles, I knew I couldn't do anything unless a miracle happened.

Which was the moment Edge showed up like a bat out of hell, screaming down from my 11 o'clock high.

"Edge, Fox 2!"

The Phantom turned tail and ran from Edge, back towards me and in range. I rolled to turn and chase the Phantom which dove low towards the hard deck in a Split-S, while Edge turned off back after the other Phantom she had been chasing earlier. I followed suit, closing some precious distance, and inching me closer to effective range.

"Edge, Fox 3!" the call came for the downing of the other Phantom that I had no idea where the hell it even was.

"Good kill, good kill," Baseplate said, much to my relief, "One target to go."

Cobra 4 became more and more desperate. He knew that he was the last one out there, and the two of us were circling all around to bring him down. I made a high yo-yo turn as Edge forced the last Phantom to make another 180 back towards the base. I locked him with my last available missile and made the call.

"Blaze, Fox 2!" I exclaimed, the relief evident in my voice.

"All bogies downed and accounted for Charlie Team, nice work and nice flying," Baseplate congratulated us, "You are clear to RTB."

Edge formed back up off my right wing a few seconds later, giving me a thumbs up. I returned the gesture as we returned uneventfully to Heierlark and landed. Our opponents landed a few minutes after Edge and I made it off the runway and were getting ready to run through shutdown and the post-flight checks. I was already anticipating a dressing-down for my reckless flying, but I had a sneaking suspicion that 'Papa Bear' Butler would probably back me up in the debrief, since he had already vouched for me in similar situations in the past. If not, I was prepared to defend myself. After Kei and I had shut down the Tigers, both of us headed back to the briefing room, ready to finally find out if we were done with our training, at long last.

A couple of the guys, Echo and Gopher included, congratulated us with a few high-fives and pats on the back. Gopher told me that they had listened in on the whole sortie up at the control tower due to a still-owed payment for a favor. I definitely felt nice in that moment that despite everything, the guys still wanted to listen in and cheer me on in whatever way they could.

An adjutant came up and told Kei and I that we had a few minutes to get changed into our BDUs before the debrief started. I was most certainly relieved since I was desperate to get into some fresh clothes and out of my G-suit. After about a five minute turnaround, I was ready to get the last of the formalities out of the way.

I waited outside the briefing room as a few officers, some familiar and some unfamiliar, filtered in and out of the door. After another minute or so, Kei showed up, with a small smirk on her face.

"You ready, Ross?" she asked, giving me a knock on the shoulder. She stood next to me, crossing her legs and leaning against wall with a slightly tired look.

"Sure," I answered with a shrug, "Better now than never. I'm ready to move on. How about you?"

"Yeah, in a way I am, and in others I'm not."

I raised an eyebrow at this, "Really? How so?"

"I don't know," Kei sighed. She was silent for a few moments as she rubbed her forehead then flicked a few stray hairs out of her face. "It just…I don't think I'm really ready for this. Maybe with another month or two I can actually be where I need to be, skills wise."

I scoffed at that without hesitation. "Oh come on, Nagase. You're seriously telling me after your performance today you're not ready? Take a second to realize what we've done. We won an engagement being outnumbered two-to-one in numbers, not to mention these guys probably have way more experience than we do. Sure, it's a training exercise and not the real thing, but I don't really see any merit to the shit you're spewing right now. Look at the facts and not the delusions your mind is weaving to try and make you give up before you even start."

"But I…just…" she muttered under her breath, her eyes still fixed on the floor.

I sighed and rolled my eyes at her, "Did you get a kill?"

"Huh?"

"You heard me. I want you to tell me."

Kei was silent again, but I got an answer back. "Yes."

"Right. And who was flying that plane?"

"An instructor, most likely."

"Right again, so what does that mean?"

"That I shot down a pilot who is good enough to teach other pilots like us."

I nodded with a growing smile, "See? We both had a good day."

Kei nodded back, "I guess you're right," she was distracted by something behind me. I turned around to see the same adjutant as before motioning for us to come in the briefing room. "Guess it's time."

"Yeah, looks to be that way. Let's get it over with," I said as I turned and began to walk in the room.

"Roger," Kei responded back, which made me smile a little.

Inside though, she was already driving me crazy.

 _Man, if I'm the one giving advice like that, she's way, way, way worse than me. I may have to get Butler to have a word with her before we ship out. I hope to God there's not going to be a real war. She's going to have a meltdown and confidence crises every day once she gets stuck in real combat. God, just help her get her mind right, if nothing else. I pray for that._

Once inside the briefing room, I noticed right away there had been a little change in the interior decoration. All of the chairs for the pilots had been moved back and out of the way. There were two tables now at the front of the room instead of the usual singular, worn-out, wooden podium. There were six people seated at the two tables, four at one on the left, and two at the right. The right side was made up of the familiar faces, Col. Steiner and Lt. Col. Butler. The faces on the left side were utterly unfamiliar to me, but there was a lot of big ranks flashing over there. A full-bird colonel, two leaf colonels and a major.

Kei and I both saluted and presented ourselves for the debrief. Steiner put us at ease to receive our evaluations. Of course, since it probably appeared by my record I was easy pickings, the full-bird colonel stood up and addressed me first. He looked to be in his early forties, with shoots of grey hairs spaced out in his dark brown hair. The colonel looked pretty skinny, and his face didn't hide his rather bony jaw. His brown eyes were dull in color but not lacking in their gaze's power. His name tag listed his last name as Walker.

"Second Lieutenant Ross Mitchell," Col. Walker called.

"Sir," I replied instantly, taking a step forward.

"Having experienced your conduct today, I am not surprised at all by the rap sheet you have, lieutenant."

"Sir, I do think you're surprised by that."

"You do, huh?" Walker responded, his eyes starting to flood with anger.

"We're the first ones aren't we, sir?" I asked, directing my attention over towards Steiner.

"That's an affirmative, lieutenant," Steiner answered quickly as he folded his arms. He seemed to be interested in the argument I was going to try and weave.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Kei's eyes widening at that revelation.

"If it's my character you want to slam, Colonel Walker," I replied, "I can understand it. I'm not the one with the pretty resume and spotless character that makes the force look good. Sir, both Lieutenant Nagase and I are probably the most qualified candidates to go to Sand Island in a long time at this stage in our careers. I'm sorry I'm not the flashy name you can parade around about beating you and the other officers. I'm not going to apologize for my behavior during the sortie, sir."

"And why aren't you?" A black-haired half-colonel asked from her seat next to Walker.

"Would you prefer I speak technically, or not, ma'am?"

"Say whatever you think is necessary to save your ass from the fryer, lieutenant," she snapped back.

 _Wow. They just really do not like me._

"By God, Anderson," Steiner groaned, "Is this just another tribunal for you, or are you going to be an impartial judge for once and let Mitchell explain himself?"

Lt. Col Anderson slid back in her chair, deflated slightly by Steiner's comments. Butler face was growing more contorted with frustration. He looked desperate to speak, but he most likely had the same hunch that I did that Walker would shut him down as soon as he opened his mouth.

"I took a risk in making the attack on, I assume, Colonel Walker?"

Walker nodded.

"Well," I continued, "Consider the situation I was in, sir. I was already attacking a target when you made me turn tail, and I knew from the beginning of the fight Lieutenant Nagase and I were outnumbered. I knew the only way I was going to get the kill and survive more than another ten seconds was to make it difficult for the tailing fighter to keep following and force him to hesitate just enough for me to make a move of my own. I also knew I had to be a fast as I could so I could help my wingman as well. That's my line of reasoning, sir."

"Is that satisfying enough, Walker?" Steiner said, glaring daggers over towards his fellow bird colonel.

"It's fine," Walker begrudgingly admitted as he took his seat, "Lieutenant Mitchell has passed the examination."

"Sir," I snapped, as I saluted and took my place back level with Nagase. Walker half-heartedly saluted.

Kei's examination was much more uneventful, with her 'interrogator' being that leaf colonel Anderson. She basically only had to explain her attack on the running Phantom that I couldn't catch up with and how we teamed up on the last fighter after that. She was also given a pass.

With Kei's eval done, the four instructors left excluding the major, whose name was Watson, if I remember it correctly. He handed us our certification documents and some other menial paperwork. Watson was fairly well-built and an inch or two shorter than me with really short blonde hair and blue eyes. From what I remember he was actually nice and congratulated us. He even told us that he was Cobra 4, the one pilot that had given us quite a lot of trouble.

"Well, if we ever get in another war, I'd love to be your wingman, sir," I said, holding out my hand.

Watson smiled and shook back "We'd love to have someone like you in the 10th Squadron. When your assignment time comes up, give me a call. I'd be glad to get you a spot."

"As long as Walker isn't there or those others, I'm game," I laughed.

"Of course," Watson smirked as headed out, "Nice work you two."

A few moments passed and then Steiner and Butler came over to give us their congratulations and handshakes. Some of the other cadets filed in to the room and began jumping and cheering as they swarmed us.

"Drinks are on me tonight!" Butler yelled to everyone's joy as we all left the briefing room for a well-deserved party.

* * *

 **AN/: And with that the training at Heierlark and complete and the move to Sand Island is very near. Ch.3 will be covering the transition period before Blaze and Edge ship out along with some more backstory detail. Which means some more time with Ross and Trisha. I'm sure a few of you may be surprised by this, but I've always wanted to do a non-BlazexEdge pairing in my AC5 story since everyone has done it to death and much better than I ever could anyway. I know you guys are desperate, most likely just as much as I am, to get to Shorebirds and the chaos. Don't worry. When the time comes, it's going to be freaking epic. The wait will be worth it.**

 **As always, please do not hesitate to let me know what you all think.**

 **Tschüss,**  
 **Esquire 6.**


	3. Chapter 3

**AN/: Hey everyone! It's been a little while. Winter break and AC7 can definitely cause some serious procrastination. I hope you all have enjoyed the game as much as I have. It's really amazing and an awesome return to Strangereal. Also, I think there may be some new faces around here too which is pretty cool.**

 **Anyways, this chapter is filling in some background and the expansion of the AU universe a little bit with some more faces that I want to enter into the annals of my version of Strangereal's history. Of course, I don't own anything anyway. Enjoy.**

* * *

 _"The battle is tough but if you reach where you want to go, then at least in some sense it is worth it."_

 _-Adolf Galland_

Ch.3 Choose Life

 _The following text is an excerpt from Albert Genette's series of articles for the Osean Broadcasting Corporation chronicling the history of Sand Island Air Force Base, with the unofficial collective title of "Out of Many Wings, Four"._

 _This excerpt can be found in Genette's published volume of journalistic works,_ So Much For a Little Peace _, Chapter 5, "Finding Roger Dowd"._

* * *

—July 27, 1959—

Rat-racing.

That was a fighter pilot's dream job. The open skies over the endless seas beckoned to all pilots across Osea.

Get your ass to Sand Island. Go prove that you're one of the best of the best.

Sand Island, for many years, had served as a training squadron for Osea's first forays into aerial combats with biplanes and monoplanes during its intermittent conflicts with Belka. But with the end of the Second Osean War in 1944, and the development of jet-powered combat aircraft, a new breed of men and pilots were needed to instruct the next generation of aces. And chief among that crew of hot-shots was Roger Dowd.

'The Dodger' as he was known, Dowd was unique even among the forward-thinker pilots and tacticians of his time. He had barely missed service in the Second Osean War, but flew combat missions in the years following during his country's many disputes across the Osean continent. Dowd earned a reputation as quite the talker, but even more so, as an unbelievable pilot.

As a result, Dowd received the command of the newly created Fighter Weapons School at Sand Island Air Force Base. Eager to prove the value of dogfighting into the distant future, Dowd buried himself heavily into the evolution of air combat tactics, and late at night, at Air Force bars across Osea, rat-racers told stories of that 'Mad Major' over at Sand Island…

* * *

"Alright, airspace is clear Voodoo 1," the ground controller reported as twelve F-100 Super Sabres, "Huns", as the pilots affectionally called them, broke from their circling pattern over the seemingly minuscule Sand Island AFB. Each of the fighters bore a dark black tail, with a gold and black checkerboard pattern adorning the top of the vertical stabilizer. To even fly an aircraft with the gold checkerboard was a privilege among the brotherhood of Air Force pilots. To even fly or breathe the same air as Roger Dowd was something every true jet jockey dreamed of.

"Roger, ground control, Voodoo 1 to all aircraft, proceed due south west, heading 195, over," Dowd's voice roared over the radio. It would only be a few more minutes. An agonizing wait to get a chance to tangle with the Dodger himself and earn immortal glory. Perhaps he would be the first one to finally win the challenge and shoot down the Dodger.

For those removed from the era of the early Air Force, the thirty second challenge means nothing. Almost no one can even remember the significance behind it. But at that time, the thirty second challenge was a legend in itself, unlike anything before or after.

Each pilot, upon arrival at the FWS, was selected for his great aptitude as a combat pilot from every squadron across the service. So, when these hot-shot, second lieutenant butter-bars got to Sand Island, the first thing Dowd did was send those airmen up against him. Each one would get their chance to shoot him down in thirty seconds. They even got to have the initial advantage on Dowd.

Even so, those unwitting pilots had become the unfortunate prey of a pilot so firmly in his prime. But on that hot July day in 1959, something different happened in those swirling skies over the Pacific ocean.

The first Marine pilot ever allowed to FWS was in the air. His name was Will Burton, callsign 'Astro'. He had been recommended due to his stellar record and displayed skill flying F4D Skyrays. Lieutenant Burton, unlike the other Air Force pilots surrounding him, did not barge in the door boasting about whether or not he could shoot down Dowd. Burton had another goal in mind.

 _Just. Don't. Lose._

He repeated this mantra over and over in his mind, as the Huns reached the combat airspace, and one by one the Air Force pilots took on Dowd.

"Guns, guns, guns!" the Dodger would always call after what only seemed to be a few seconds.

With that call, each pilot was defeated, and each fell back silently, with a bruised ego and a quiet voice in response to a quick and comprehensive beating.

When the ten challengers before him had fallen, Dowd called on Burton to step up to the plate.

"Last but not least, the Leatherneck has his turn," Dowd cackled as his last victim slinked back to his fellow failures of the day, "Hopefully you've got something they don't, Lieutenant."

Burton simply grunted in response. He was too wound up to really do much else. Burton maneuvered his Hun into the six o'clock position behind Dowd, and true to his callsign, Burton's mind turned to the heavens and how he could survive. It was now or never.

"Fight's on!" Astro yelled as both of the fighters launched onto their afterburners and into a steep climb. The Dodger was demonstrating quickly why his callsign was so appropriate. As Astro continued into the chase, desperately clinging onto the tail of the Dodger's Hun, he felt more and more that he was going to die chasing this crazy Major. The F-100 was straining hard, creaking as the turns only got tighter and faster.

The Dodger jinked upwards into an Immelmann turn as Astro hurled his fighter into an attacking barrel roll, sending his Hun into a corkscrew and soon diving down hard on the Dodger. Astro glanced down at his wristwatch, 15 seconds had passed. And to him, they felt like an eternity.

Astro still had another eternity to survive against the Dodger.

And just when Astro's focused had drifted away for a brief moment, the tricky Dodger pounced.

The Dodger had quite the maneuver he had pioneered for the Hun. Dowd pulled hard back on the stick, and slammed his feet onto the rudder pedals.

The little aircraft in front of Astro "flat-plated", lurching vertically and shuddering to an almost sudden halt in front of him. Dowd forced this dilemma upon every pilot he faced, it was an incredibly useful determinate of whether or not a pilot truly understood how his aircraft functioned and how conserving energy was important in every movement of the aircraft. At this time, many upper brass scoffed at Dowd's research on determining Energy for combat aircraft and how to effectively harness it through aircraft design. Many called Dowd's "flat-plating" a gimmick.

But then again, you'd say anything was a gimmick if you continually lost over and over again.

So, how did Astro react?

Astro, when faced with a rapidly decelerating opponent, turned and burned in the opposite direction of the Dodger. He knew that putting himself in front of the Dodger in that situation would earn him a quick end.

The Dodger was surprised by the leatherneck Astro.

 _Huh. Turns out there's a good Marine pilot out there after all_ , he thought as he reversed and began chasing after Astro's Hun.

Only ten seconds of the fight was left. Astro scurried through several tight turns, refusing to enter any sort of climbing fight with the Dodger after his "flat-plating" demonstration. The seconds ticked by in agony for Astro. The other Air Force pilots couldn't believe it. The jarhead was going to survive the Dodger's aerial wrath.

Astro was breathing harder and harder as he got closer to survival. The Dodger was right on his six, and Astro forced him into a rolling scissors, desperate just to get that crazy Major to overshoot and end the fight. Each pass of the scissors went by in slow motion for Astro. As he would stare across to stare at the Dodger, he swore he could see that crazy bastard grinning ear-to-ear under his oxygen mask. With only a moment left until Astro could no longer keep himself going, Astro flat-plated the bird himself, pulling the Dodger's famous move on the old man himself. With Astro's Hun barely making it out of the Dodger's gunsight pipper, and the old man overshooting the leatherneck, the reprieve came.

"That's time!" one of the Air Force pilots called.

Astro's eyes almost bulged out their sockets at the news.

 _I did it! I can't believe it! I did it!,_ Astro mentally rejoiced as he pumped his fists and banged his feet into the floor of the F-100 in utter joy.

"Don't be too pleased with yourself, leatherneck," Dowd spat as he glared over from Astro's left wing, "I'd like to have a word with you on the ground."

Burton gulped.

A few minutes later with all the pilots on the ground, all the Air Force jockeys slinked off to the debrief, saying each other,

"I almost had him."

"I was so close."

"Next time, I'll get the Dodger."

Dowd hopped out of his Hun and found Burton waiting for him not but a few feet away. Much to Burton's surprise, Dowd was smiling uncontrollably.

"Tiger, you've got quite the set of balls to do what you did up there today," Dowd howled with laughter, giving Burton a slap on the shoulder.

Burton's eyes widened even further.

 _Dowd only calls the best pilots Tiger. People bend over backwards just to even be considered by Dowd as a Tiger. A Tiger meant meant you had a serious set of balls. And Dowd just called me a Tiger after my first sortie with him._

 _Ho-ly shit._

As Burton's mind continued to explode at his good fortune, Dowd turned the conversation elsewhere.

"Burton, I want to ask you something, and it's something that I don't want you to take lightly. Some people are more concerned with their career and being a general at that damned building in Oured. They want to **be** somebody. All they want is a bunch of subordinates who treat them like Moses coming down from the mountain and security, in exchange for selling their soul. Now, there's a few people who throw that away to **do** something and change the way we fly those crates forever. The brass are going to hate you for it. They're going to try their damnedest to kick your ass out to the curb. It's not easy. But, you're going to have to make that choice, whether now or later, either to be someone or to do something. How are you gonna answer that question, Tiger?" Dowd stated, his eyes locked on Burton's every move, seemingly his every thought too.

Burton, glanced down for a moment, then looked back up at that crazy Major, with almost a similar grin to the one he had seen earlier.

"I'll do so much that they'll run scared. It's high time the nest got rustled."

And as a result of the pact between 'The Mad Major' and the 'Mean Marine', the flying men of Osea would never be the same.

* * *

"Where to now, hot-shot?" Trisha said with a smirk as I collapsed into the passenger seat of her pickup truck. She was wearing one of my 'gifts', a green surplus combat jacket with one of my training squadron patches sewn on. She always liked carrying a little part of me around with her like that.

"Home would be nice."

Trisha had made the thirty or so minute drive up to Heierlark AFB to give me a ride home. Beyond that, it was just more of an excuse to spend time together. We knew that time over the next few, precious days would be our last together for a while. As much as I thought I was getting close to popping the question, I didn't really want to force it and displace Trisha from the good gig she had going. Sand Island couldn't hold me forever; I dreamed of the day that a nice posting on the mainland would finally come.

"So, how are things at Heierlark?" Trisha prodded again, her curiosity again leading the way into the silence.

I laughed, "Heierlark is a funny place. Fighter pilots are a different kind of people."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I'm not entirely sure," I answered, far from confident. My eyes darted around to the forest and gigantic pine trees surrounding the road. Volsten placed itself in the middle ground between the rugged forest and the arid Belkan plains. After being in the relative industrial area of Heierlark for so long, the base already seemed far away. "I met this one pilot, and she's quite the enigma."

"Oh yeah, the one you mentioned on the phone the other day?" Trisha responded with a quick glance and a smile, "From what you told me, it sounds like she could use some of your patented pep-talks."

I snorted.

"What?"

"Trisha, I have no idea why she's even in the Air Force."

She furrowed her brow, with a sliver of her braided red hair almost falling down to her face. A lightning flash of her hand pushed the offender back into place. "Ok, well, care to elaborate?"

"Nagase is going to fold under fire."

"Right, so you're saying that's Nagase can't handle the stress when the shit hits the fan…and, if she can't handle it in training, she's going to get people killed."

I held up my hands and shrugged, "Basically, that's my thoughts. Couldn't have said it any better."

"Why are you so sure about it? Are you so sure that you're going to be able to handle it better?"

Now it was my turn for my brow to furrow back, "I wouldn't say that I'm sure about myself. I can't really know that until I get into combat, and who knows if I'd ever find myself in that sort of situation. But, I will say that I'm confident that I can keep my wingmen together. I've found in training that a lot of the same problems I faced getting people to work together on the line in hockey apply here. They're still just people in the end. I just have a hunch that I'm going to have to keep an eye on Nagase if the gauntlet gets thrown."

"Hmm. Still as convincing and logical as ever," Trisha giggled as she placed her right hand in my left, "You could probably talk entire nations out of a war."

"Everyone except the Belkans," I snarked back, triggered a wave of laughter between the two of us as the truck, at last, rolled into Volsten. The town of about 30,000 or so, still hummed along just the same as the day I had left it. We looped around town on Route 43, looking down from about a hundred feet up on the rustic, former Belkan town. A mix of newer brick buildings and older, Fachwerk black-and-white style abodes populated the center of town. With the sun setting off to the west, at my 2 o'clock, many would begin their nightly pilgrimage to one of the several beer halls to drink and talk about their days. Life here seemed more fit to fifty years ago, rather than 2010.

Where our families lived was beyond where the forests dared to grow in the open fields to the west of Volsten. Not a whole lot of people lived out there, but there were several collections of homes not far from each other seemingly out on their own away from civilization.

"Finally back where you can breathe again," Trisha almost whispered as she gazed off into the distance, and the never ending horizon of endless green fields and dirt roads.

After a few more minutes of trundling along the beaten path through the fields, a simple brown two-story house suddenly jutted out of the ground. The same place that I'd spent many of my formative young years before and after moving to Cranston. The house looked far ahead of its time and modern, more like a cabin-style home you'd see in a fancy home-living magazine. My momentary optimism drooped when I only saw one car parked outside the house. Trisha drove up the paved driveway and she immediately noticed the absent car too. Her smile drooped slightly.

"I guess he's gone again, huh?"

I nodded quietly as the truck stopped and we both got out. The house definitely dwarfed the two of us. And standing there in BDUs, it almost didn't feel homely anymore. It felt foreign and distant from any part of the life I was living now. Instead of feeling happy, all I felt was disappointment. But after a moment, a familiar face came waltzing out the front door in precise, swift steps. My mother, Anya, stood a few inches shorter than me, with bright blonde hair. Her blue eyes were sharp and clear, glancing quickly between Trisha and I. She was wearing a black dress, and arms perpetually crossed at me with a knowing, relieved smile lifted her cheeks.

"мать," I reflexively called as I dropped my green duffle bag without a second thought; I ran over and we hugged for what seemed to be a little while.

"I'm sorry your father isn't here to see you," my mom answered with a peck on my cheek as well, "But I'm overjoyed you came nonetheless. Tolya will be very happy to see you again."

"Tolya's back?" Trisha interjected, giving voice to my growing surprise.

"Yes," Anya replied, "He recovered well enough from the heart-attack that he could be back home again."

"Well, that's a relief," Trisha nodded.

After a few moments of silence, Anya spoke up. "Let's continue inside, shall we?"

After properly closing the door to the truck I had neglected earlier, I hurried indoors after the girls and hurried to go find Tolya.

Now, why do any of us care about this guy Tolya?

It's a long story.

Tolya is my mom's father. At that time, he was 75 years old and far removed from his better days. It was one of the few times I did get to see him when his health began to deteriorate since my Air Force life interfered with any small chance I got to talk to him again. What was more interesting was his past. Like my mother, he was Yuktobanian, born and bred. He had actually served in the Yuktobanian air force as a test pilot and later combat pilot, flying Mig-15s, 17s, 19s, and later was the chief test pilot that flew the first Mig-21 prototype. His callsign was 'Titan', due to his immense reputation as a pilot, and, more honestly, his overbearing attitude. He was notorious for talking up a storm about anything and everything, and was even more vocal about how much he disliked his superiors. Tolya would talk so much shit, that his superiors would challenge him in mock combat to see if he could back up his boasting. According to a story Tolya told me, he had challenged a general who had been awarded a Hero of the Union medal from his service in the Osean war. Everyone was shocked that he, a young captain, had the gall to even talk to the General, let alone boast to his face.

But the General, didn't advocate punishment. He simply took the challenge. In Mig-15's, the two pilots battled each other until they ran out of fuel with no victor in sight. When they came down, the general called for more fuel and they went straight back up again. Tolya told this fanciful story of turning so hard he thought he'd dislocated his neck, but regardless, the turn gave him the positioning to win. Afterwards, there were no harsh words and no scolding. The General simply shook hands with him and carried on.

Of course, my mother prefaced anything Tolya said that he probably was bullshitting the whole story. Tolya's life was full of a lot of half-truths. When I went to a reunion party with Tolya to meet his old wing-mates, I asked them if that story was true, and they laughed and laughed at me. They eventually told me that it wasn't a general. It was actually a colonel who would later become Marshal of the Yuke Air Force. And the fight hadn't gone on that long. It lasted about thirty seconds before Tolya hosed the big man down. The dancing around fight was actually when Tolya had been challenged by a young recruit many years later named Vasiliy Apakidze, who was seen as Tolya's successor in the Pilot Cadre of Yuktobania. Word was that he was still in the Yuktobanian Naval Air Force, going around kicking ass and taking names much like Tolya had before him.

The iron-clad man himself was sitting upstairs in his favorite, old wing chair, sitting firmly upright as he stared longingly into the clouds. Tolya's dark black eyes darted to Trisha and myself as we walked into my father's repurposed office. A toothy grin greeted us, as the wiry, bald old man, tanned to utmost degree, smacked his walking cane into the floor and pushed himself up to greet us.

"Ah, so my dashing officer grandson comes home at last!" Tolya shouted, his voice clear and full as ever

I gave him a soft hug as he clapped my back hard, "Well, I'm happy you think I look that good!"

His gaze quickly turned to Trisha, "And the young lady with such charm graces our presence once again. I wish my wife could have met you."

Trisha blushed heavily at Tolya's remark but couldn't stop herself from smiling at the old man's behavior. She definitely was becoming a firm part of the Mitchell family now. "I'm flattered, Mr. Ilyinishna."

"Well!" Tolya quickly retorted as he took his seat in his chair again, "I have to say I'm flattered by that, no one has called me Mr. Ilyinishna in a long, long, time. She's got a smart head on her shoulders, Ross. I can't believe how lucky you are, by God, you're lucky."

I began blushing now as I glanced over to Trisha, who had put her hand over her mouth to hide her chuckling. My mother, as always stood in the doorway, her gaze focused on her father, with a small smile on the side of her mouth.

Most of the conversations with Tolya carried on this way. My grandfather had a way with his own particular brand of "Starik" or "Greybeard" humor. After a few minutes of updating him on my new life in the Air Force, he was overjoyed that I was going to Sand Island. He did say something that surprised me when we left to go to Trisha's house.

"Go say hello to Roger Dowd for me, if that old bastard is still alive, that is!"

That name sounded immensely familiar, yet infinitely distant at the same time.

 _I swear, I've heard that damn name before. But where…_

My mother snapped me out of my conundrum-based stupor with a hug as Trisha hopped back in her truck and started it up. "I know you don't want to be around here, and I know you're probably angry that your dad isn't home again. But, you know he loves you a lot. I'm sure he's just as angry about as you are."

"He needs to really retire if that's the case. He shouldn't be a walking charity case for the spooks," I growled as I kissed my mom on the cheek and leaped into my seat in the truck.

Anya smiled and chuckled to herself a bit, "I wish he would. But you know how he is."

"Yeah, I know and you know. But he doesn't seem to know."

"You can't change everyone to how you want, Ross."

"Doesn't mean I can't tell them what I think."

My mom begrudgingly nodded as Trisha's truck darted away.

 _Away from my own special hell. I shouldn't have come home. It never gets better._

* * *

The next stop was to see Trisha's family for a few minutes. It was really only some small pleasantries, some talk about how things were going, gifts for her younger brother and her little sister, some spent 20mm casings from marksman training and some white Edelweiß mountain flowers respectively. Her brother, John, quietly accepted the gift, and although he never really said much, he accepted it happily, showing a lot more emotion than I had seen in a long time. Veronica, her sister, was more visibly overjoyed by the flowers and paraded them around for everyone to see. Both of Trisha's older brothers were long gone, off to more lucrative careers and their own lives. It felt a little quieter without David and Mick running around causing trouble. I missed the simpler days of high school where your only worries were homework and what you were going to do afterwards.

In contrast to my home, everything always seemed more upbeat at the Walden's house. More laughter, more smiling, but not in a purposefully deceitful way. That was Trisha's dad's way.

He was imposing. Mark stood over six feet tall, glaring down at almost everyone with his watchful blue eyes. His bright blonde hair, however, betrayed his lighter side, since he smiled almost endlessly. I had maybe only seen him not smiling once in my life. His stony jaw and toned body highlighted Mark's continued conditioning following his short military career. Mark had run into my father during that time. Neither man really talked much about those days, although I felt that Mark was somewhat upset with my Dad for running off back into that world so many times after he continually claimed those days were over.

Mark ran a strict house yet the rules were straightforward. If you did what he asked, there would be no problems, ever. No one dared to question him when the black sheep of the Walden family, Mick, mouthed off after he graduated from college and told Mark that his success was all his own and that he had nothing at home anymore he cared about. There are stories that even people in town heard Mark's wrath that night. But regardless, he had a very compassionate and kind side. His post-military life revolved around reintegrating veterans into civilian life, primarily through support groups and service animals. It was a lucrative business, but Mark always made it about the veterans he helped, rather than himself. Mark was a unique breed of person.

Mark was the real reason I was there today. I had to ask him a question that I was deathly afraid bringing up to him.

I had to ask him if I could marry his daughter.

Up to that moment I walked into his office, and he kindly gestured for me to take a seat next to him, I ran millions of possibilities through my head of what could possibly happened. I thought I was prepared for every single outcome. Whether good or bad I thought I had it figured out.

"So, what's up Ross?"

I didn't even wait. I just blurted it out, after glancing over my shoulder to make sure Trisha wasn't standing in the doorway. "Mr. Walden, do I have your permission to ask Trisha to marry me?"

His trademark smile didn't really fade that much at my question. He just sat there just chuckling to himself a little bit. He leaned forward a little bit in his chair and clasped his hands together.

 _Uh. Ok, great. But, he hasn't said anything. What does this whole routine mean…oh. Shit. He may be getting ready to say no. Or…_

But Mark seemed to sense my growing inner turmoil, "I can tell you're nervous, and I know you well enough that you're already ready for damage control."

I sighed and tried to compose myself for a response, "Yeah…I… I just don't…"

"Yes."

I froze.

"The answer is yes, Ross."

"What?"

"I think it's pretty clear what I mean, kiddo." Mark stood up and walked over to the window, with the falling rays of sunlight snaking in. He chuckled at nothing in particular and looked back over to me. "I figured you'd be asking this question a lot earlier than now, honestly. But, you still did it." He walked back over to where I sat and stood expectantly in front of me. "You can stand up now, Ross."

I willed myself up, breaking the growing shell my brain had been wrapping around me. Mark just smiled again once we were back on eye level. "I'm sorry, Mr. Walden."

"About what?"

"That I made myself look like a dunce in doing this whole charade."

"Ha! I'm just messing with you Ross," Mark slapped my shoulder, "You're fine, Ross. Don't sweat it. I don't think there's anyone else out there better for my daughter. You've proven time and time again your exceptional character and ability. I know that sounds like more military jargon, and hell, that's the last thing you want to hear on leave. But, seriously, I mean it. You're a special person. Just make sure you don't give up on yourself and don't give up on Trisha. You two together can do just about anything."

"Thanks, Mr. Walden," I sighed in relief, snapping to give him a salute.

 _Ah, the patented 'screwing with Ross because it's funny watching the gears turn in my head'. Looks like there's more of that in my future now._

Mark laughed again as he returned it. "I'm pretty sure you outrank me now, kiddo."

"Well, I think rank is bullshit sometime, sir."

"I think I can agree with that. And cut the sir shit out, Ross. Mark is fine."

"Alright Mark, and thank you."

A few minutes later I was back out to the truck riding with Trisha back to her apartment in Volsten. Her dad stood in the doorway of their house as we left, his smile bigger than I'd ever seen.

"What's up with my dad?" Trisha inquired, looking at me with a wry smile, "Did you tell him the true meaning of life or something?"

With a chuckle, I replied, "Maybe. I think it'll make everyone around here happy, at least fairly soon."

"Really? You'll have to let me know what that is sometime."

"Oh trust me, you'll be the first to know."

* * *

 **AN/: I know. A lot of fluff is atypical for me. But, I wanted to give you guys a very clear picture of Ross' character before shit hits the fan. It'll help bring context to a lot of things, at least I hope it does. The Dowd storyline is going to expand more and more over time. His influence is going to be big. He has some real life inspiration from one hell of a pilot in the US Air Force, and if you piece together the clues, you'll probably find out who pretty quickly. Good luck if you begin searching. It's going to shatter a lot of conceptions about what you know about combat flying.**

 **Anyways. As always, don't hesitate to send your feedback. I'm trying to improve in areas that I wasn't as good in in HoW and my other stories, so I think you probably noticed some growing pains. It's all part of the process. Have to do something, rather than nothing.**

 **For the next update, I'm going to try and have it posted next weekend since it's my birthday(!) and give the chapter out as a present to everyone. I'm going to try and post more frequently(*looks at last update which I said the same exact thing and it took me three months* Don't trust me on anything lol). But I think I should be better on scheduling since my classes are much, much easier and it's downhill to undergrad college graduation. I didn't think I'd ever get this far, but hey, if I can do it, so can you. The battle has only just begun.**

 **Tschüss,**

 **Esquire 6.**


	4. Chapter 4

**AN/: I'm finally back. Special thanks goes out to Silver Winged Duck, IronRunner97, and Loose Cannon Doccy for their help in finally helping me get this chapter pushed out. I'm sorry it took so long and that it's so short. But this chapter has been one of the hardest for me to write in a long time. More explanation after, but I'd like you to have a chance to read it first instead of listening to me rant. Enjoy.**

* * *

 _"There's always something in the game you wish you would have done different. That's why players improve, because they learn from what they did before. They might have been guessing before, but now they know." -Gordie Howe a.k.a. Mr. Hockey_

Chapter 4: We Few, We Happy Few

* * *

All it takes is a few taps on a cell phone. I had an "urgent" line to all the old hockey boys from the good 'ol days, and I did my best to keep the messages short and sweet.

Within a few moments this message was sent out over the airwaves: "Big Show, Wednesday night. 1900. Bring whoever and whatever goodies you want. It's finally happening."

Responses came in thick and fast. Out of twenty names, eight put themselves down in the affirmative. Not bad for pretty short notice.

The old rink in Volsten was our ice palace back in high school. Many hours were spent racing around the rink in rec leagues or just grinding it out in practice. It was a bit run down and dilapidated but the ice was still some the best in the country. I can still remember the first time skating back in Cranston, and remember just how shocked I was at the difference in the ice. A bunch of old timers kept the rink up day in and day out for us, even after we moved on for the next generations of Volsten skaters to find their talents and skills. It was a wondrous place, and I hated being the only one out there

So, I called my best friend, Nils Sturm, from high school out early the day before the big meet-up to skate and talk a bit. Nils was a year older than me, and the captain of Volsten high school team when I was an assistant captain. He was a little bit taller than I was but a bit more lanky and skinny with super bleached blonde hair. A full blooded Belkan, a fact he spoke very little about, he had dark blue eyes that could put fear into almost anyone. As the team's top defenseman, he anchored the Volsten team with great shutdown play as well as commanding respect from teammates and opponents alike. He had a distinctive scar below his right eye from where an errant puck had dislodged the plastic visor from helmet cutting him rather badly. Whenever Nils would get one of his typical ear to ear grins, that scar would become extremely visible. A lot of the younger guys back in the day called him 'Narbe Nils' or 'Scar Nils' as a result. When he showed up to the rink, gear in tow, the barrage began.

"Oh, here he is, Herr Kommandant thinking he owns me entirely now," Nils yelled as I walked out to greet him in the parking lot.

"Why would I own you? You might as well be a zombie now with how that scar has taken over your life!" I barked back, giving Nils a friendly slap on the back.

The old captain shrugged, "Verdammt, We're both old men now, aren't we Ross?"

"And we aren't getting any younger."

Nils chuckled as he heaved his bag up over his shoulder, "No. We sure aren't."

We both headed inside to the rink to get our gear on and of course, Nils had his anticipatory radar fully activated and operational. The way he was watching me as I got ready, he could instantly tell I was much more nervous than usual. A slight shake in my hands, a bit of hesitation in putting on my skates, little small things here and there that to a hawk like Nils meant a great deal.

"What's this thing tomorrow really about Ross?" Nils asked as he wrapped up the grip on his stick with friction tape, "You're going crazy over there."

"Well…"

"Just spit it out, there's no point in keeping it a secret from me."

That was true. Once Nils found out about a secret, he wouldn't stop until he found out what it was. During my junior year, Nils pestered me every day for three months until he finally figured out that Trisha and I were officially dating. Even though I was mad about it, Nils kept it quiet.

"Trisha and I are getting engaged, at least I hope she says yes to getting engaged," I muttered. I felt almost embarrassed at even mentioning the whole event. Nils didn't even appear fazed. He continued on with his work as if I hadn't ever said anything.

"I'm happy for you," Nils replied out of nowhere after a few silent seconds, which made me jump up a few centimeters, "You and Trisha are made to be together. She'll say yes. I wouldn't worry so much about it." I took a moment to take a deep breath as I pulled my helmet on and closed the latch loosely. Nils and I had our old green and white Volsten High Rams jerseys on as we took our first steps back on the ice through the swinging team bench door. As it closed I threw a couple of pucks out onto the fresh ice for us to mess around with if we wanted to. "Hell," Nils laughed as he took one of the pucks and quickly pushed it back and forth on the ice, "Since Olivia said yes to me, I have no doubt Trisha is going to say yes to you. We give each other so much crap, you guys seem like a perfect movie couple in comparison."

I laughed, "That's what you think."

"Sure, I think a lot of things," Nils snarked back as he took one of the pucks and winded up into a slap shot into the empty net down across the ice which seemed far away from the center of enclosed rink. He brought his stick down in one quick motion, eliciting an almost deafening crack as he made contact with the puck. The black rubber disc flew away in a flash and hit the netting with the dull thud. Nils smiled back at me, "But, I _know_ you guys will work out. Just have a little faith. It goes a long way."

"Alright, sensei," I replied waving him off, "Let's actually see if you still got your moves, old man."

"Pah!" Nils barked, "Guess I still have a few things to teach you!"

* * *

The next night took an eternity to arrive. A whole cast of former Volsten Rams hockey legends descended on the Ice Palace for one more game, one more night under the lights to strut their stuff and show why they had won a national title.

Trisha didn't really know much about the festivities for the evening beyond the basic reunion info. As she drove the old pick-up truck over to the rink, I proceeded to almost sweat myself to death in the passenger seat. For once in my life I was dead silent. My eyes were bolted to the floor of the truck's cabin. I couldn't hide my anxiety any longer. Trisha glanced over ever few seconds but never really tried to say anything, a few times she looked like she tried to say something but nothing ever came out. After a while Trisha didn't look over anymore. She probably chalked it up to some pre-game routine since I hadn't played against these guys in a long, long time.

When we arrived at the palace and I got out to grab my gear out of the truck bed, Trisha's curiosity got her talking.

"What's wrong?"

Trisha glared at me from the other side of the truck bed. She looked worried and I felt even worse for making her feel that way. But now, I knew I could get it over with.

I sighed.

"You can tell me. You know you can, Ross."

"Let me show you something," I said quietly, gesturing towards the front of the truck. While my hands were hidden from view, I pulled out that fateful small felt box.

 _God, please, make me calm now._

When we finally met in front of the truck, it took only a moment for Trisha to see the little black box. Her eyes widened. She knew exactly what it was. When I got down on one knee, her eyes immediately began to water.

"Trisha Walden," I spoke, my voice clear of the wavering and stuttering that I thought it would have, "Will you marry me?"

It was silent for what felt like an eternity. Trisha clasped her hands over her mouth and collapsed to her knees. Now we were at eye level, staring right into each other's deepest parts of our souls. She leaned forward and wrapped her arms around me, the tears still flowing, and with a whisper, the words finally came.

"Yes, yes, yes."

I wrapped my arms tightly around her as I gently lifted her back to her feet. I placed the little silver band on her left ring finger, and we shared another big hug and a long kiss together. But it wasn't quiet much longer. The whole hockey gang were hiding behind their cars the whole time, and they burst into yelling, hooping and hollering as they ran over to congratulate us. Trisha was beyond holding back her emotions and so was I. Nils came over to us with a muted and warm smile as he hugged us both.

"Herlizchen Glückwunsch an deiner Verlobung," Nils calmly said as he took both Trisha's and my hands, "May you live in good health and love each other well."

"Thank you Nils," Trisha replied, giving him another hug, "You'll always have a special place with both of us."

"And I thank you for such a high compliment," Nils said with a bow, "Now, I think it's time we played together one last time, boys!"

* * *

It took a few minutes for everyone to get their gear on and on the ice since everyone was desperate to get a word of congratulations in with either myself or Trisha.

Our slightly reduced turnout meant we were only playing half the rink, and with only one goalie, things were going to be a little tricky.

The goalie in question was David Lehner, a former All-Osean ranked player, and a fellow member of the Osean U20 national team I was apart of that lost in the World Championship finals a few years back. With his silver and black striped goalie mask on, he seemed to be more of a giant bear than a 21 year old kid from the north part of Volsten. David was already skating around the net waiting for us to get ready, banging his stick into the ice.

"Come on ladies, you gonna talk all day and mess with your freaking hair or are we playing?" David shouted as he skated back over to the bench where most of us were almost finished getting our gear together. I was already done but busied myself with shooting the breeze with some old teammates, particularly my former linemate on the left wing James Young and Nils' old defensive partner Dirk Hornqvist. Young was a black haired, cocky son of a bitch who was quite the sniper. At the time he was working his way as an undrafted player in the minor leagues but was playing even better than he had in college. Hornqvist was another Belkan who formed our so-called "Weißherz Wall", the nickname coming from a treacherous mountain pass in the far northern reaches of Belka, which had only successfully been climbed once in its history. Hornqvist played on the defense with Nils, which made our top defensive pair the two towering blonde-haired blue-eyed Belkans, although Dirk's fate hadn't involved any major scars yet.

Nils, of course, was going to play on the other side of our 3-on-3 scrimmage match. I had Young and Hornqvist on my side, while Nils had another Yuktobanian player, Andrei Kucherov along with another Belkan, Max Wolff.

Both teams had one player who could substitute in and out when the defense forced the offense out of the blue line zone which made about a third of the whole rink and 2/3 of the half we were playing on.

With everyone ready, those starting the game slowly drifted out to the ice and took a toss of a puck to see who would be on offense first.

Nils' team won and so, James, Dirk and I all backed up into the zone and readied ourselves.

"Game on!" Nils yelled as he slotted the puck up against the boards to let Kucherov and Wolff crash the net and try to force us to clear the ice in front of the net, or the slot, and allow an easy scoring opportunity. Lehner quickly filled up the net and used his leg pads to close off the sides as Dirk and I doubled back to chase the puck with James occupying the slot.

Although Wolff got the puck first, Hornqvist quickly locked him up with a body check against the boards which allowed me to steal the puck from under their feet and rush back for a change to the attack.

"Counter! Counter!" I yelled as I passed over to James and he looped around from right to left, with Dirk and I skating out and back in from the blue line as we showered ice up into the air from our quick stop and go.

James turned his back to the net as he skated backwards, and drew Kucherov out away from myself and Nils immediately skated over to Dirk to cut him off from a passing option. He knew I didn't like to take a slap shot from the far slot, so he was daring me to go in and take Lehner one-on-one.

James sent the pass, gluing the puck to my stick not a moment later. I accelerated as I reached my stick out ahead of me with my left hand, making Lehner shift slightly to mirror my move to his stick side. He was flexing his glove hand in anticipation, guessing that I was going to drag him out and try to shoot to the right at the last minute. I pulled my stick back in as I moved the stick all around the puck. He opened up his legs as I closed in. It was a game of chance now on who would win, especially since I could see Wolff coming in from my left and Nils from my right. I decided to just poke my stick forward in one quick motion to try and get it through his legs.

As soon as it went between his pads, Lehner slammed his legs together, hoping to catch the puck before it got enough momentum to go through and into the net. But he wasn't quick enough. The puck trickled through Lehner's pads and into the net.

 _BWOOOOOOOOOOOOOAHHHHHHHHHHHH. BWOOOOOOOOOAHHHHHH._

The old ship horn sounded, signaling a good goal. I raised my stick to the air as Dirk and James hurried over for some slaps on the head and quick congratulations. I went back to the bench to switch out with our substitute, Volsten's former second line center Sam Lecavalier, a tall, lanky, but fast, player. We bumped fists as I took my seat on the bench next to Nils who switched out with his substitute, a defensive center Ian Howe, who'd probably get into a half-hearted fight before the night was over.

Although that whole sequence from the start to the goal took maybe thirty to forty five seconds, it was a hell of a workout. An average shift for a player would maybe only last another fifteen to twenty seconds if you were lucky.

Nils bumped me on the head with his helmet, "Nice work. Wanted to see if you still had it after not having a goalie to stop you yesterday."

I grunted, "Lehner's good. Even though he's only playing for fun now, I still don't know how he makes it so tough. If I hadn't shot on him a million times before in practice, I probably wouldn't have scored. You gotta be perfect with him."

"Amen to that," Nils sighed as he took a drink from his water bottle, he glanced over to see Trisha coming to join us for minute, "And look who it is, the girl of the hour."

"Having fun out there, you two?" Trisha smirked as she shuffled over and took a seat next to me, lying her head into my shoulder.

"Ach, it's not too bad. Ross hasn't scored ten goals yet."

Trisha laughed, "He's not that good anymore."

"Hey!" I lightly barked back, "Don't help him out. He's got enough ammo as it is."

"You're not wrong," Nils muttered back as he quickly hopped up to his feet. It looked like we were going back in, right in the thick of the action.

"Switch! Switch!" James yelled as I hopped over the bench wall and back onto the ice.

"Good luck," I heard over my shoulder from Trisha as I hurried out back to try and set up a defense. I held up a hand in reply as I rushed off back to battle.

That moment stuck in my head a long time after that night. I probably was just reading too much into it then and even now. For some odd reason, it seemed more sad than the moment I had to say goodbye outside Heierlark two days later. This moment seemed like a final goodbye to my old life, my old friends, my old way of being. When I went to Sand Island I knew I was going to come back a different person, whether I truly wanted to admit it or not. At the time, I didn't really feel nervous. I just had this lingering sense of melancholy. I wasn't upset about having to go. It was my job. But having such a clear cut point at which you could really tell your life was changing forever was a sobering moment.

Six months was the duration of my posting at Sand Island. I just didn't know my stay would be a little longer than expected.

And that there would be a war in the meantime.

I guess no one could've predicted that.

* * *

 **AN/: A fairly emotionally laden chapter, I would say. This chapter was definitely a leap out of my comfort zone into a more emotionally and character driven section rather than combat driven. Although I would argue that emotional and character stuff was my major weakness before(case in point, Hounds of War), but now I'm getting used to it. I'm not one who just loves sappy, romantic stuff, but I felt like I needed to have this development before Ross leaves to start his real journey to war. It gives a lot more to both his and Trisha's characters. Of course, please let me know what you think. I'd love to hear from you guys after being away for a little while. My plan is now to stop messing around and start cracking again. I'm not going to promise on any sort of schedule since graduation is near and I have to start working on my thesis papers so I'll try to get some things done. Once summer hits I plan to go on overdrive to get a lot of material out before I have to start law school in the fall.**

 **Also sorry to those who are hockeyed out by now, it'll be a long while before it becomes the main focus again. But the NHL playoffs are almost upon us! Go Bolts! (And hopefully IronRunner97's Islanders can finish ahead of the Capitals. Crossing my fingers)**

 **Thanks for stopping by und auf Wiedersehen!**

 **Esquire 6.**


	5. Chapter 5

**AN/: I'm back. I'm free from the shackles of school. Let's get rolling to Sand Island. Enjoy.**

* * *

Chapter 5: Armor

 _"History is a wellspring of lifesaving lessons. No one really invents anything."_

 _-Dan Pedersen_

* * *

-30 June 2010, 0845hrs-

"Six months seems like such a long time away," Trisha sighed as I flashed my military ID from the passenger seat of her truck over to the MP gate guard, who waved us through after a few seconds of checking his list. "But after this, we can start over. Together."

I smiled as I gave her a peck on the cheek, "And you know I wouldn't have it any other way." I grasped her right hand, gazing over at the silver band that now signaled much more than just a simple relationship. It meant a hell of a lot more than that now. It was a shared future.

Trisha parked her truck outside the barracks and let me out. I grabbed my bag from the bed of the truck and came around to share one last embrace together. It felt like it lasted for hours. I didn't want to walk away. I didn't want to have to leave her behind any more. But this time was the last time. That was the only reason I feel like I could pull myself away. One last kiss.

We held our hands together as we leaned our foreheads on each others. We gazed into each others eyes and I let go. "Only for you," I almost whispered.

"And for you only," Trisha replied as she hopped back in her truck and waved goodbye. A turn of a key and a few moments later and she was gone.

I reported in to Butler a few minutes later and he immediately sent me packing to get ready to fly out to Sand Island AFB in about an hour. On my way back to my room I ran into Nagase, still carrying that cold, wistful air with her wherever she went. She seemed to perk up slightly when I walked by.

"Hey Ross, had a good time on leave?"

"Yup, all good, gotta get my shit together."

I hurried off to get the rest of my stuff together and ready to go. It only took me about half an hour or so. Gopher wasn't too happy about having a change in roommates, but after a minute or so of back and forth jabbing, he gave me a bear-hug and wished me luck at Sand Island. I didn't really feel like talking to anyone else or really saying goodbye. I felt ready to move on. It was almost as if lingering here any longer would mean I'd start sprouting roots and find myself unable to get away.

The conservations with Butler and Steiner were short too. Simple wishes of luck and hopes of meeting again under calmer circumstances. When we had loaded up the F-5s for the journey off to Sand Island, I took one last moment to take in the mountains and the relative stillness of the valley. Mornings like this one were definitely going to be missed. I eventually willed myself up into the seat of my Tiger II and the crews locked us in.

The jet engines of the two Tigers eventually whined into life as the ground crews waved us off into to takeoff positions. I was in lead again. Nagase, despite being in line to taxi to the runway first, instead, she waited for me to go. She seemed to be more comfortable in the tail position, and honestly, I didn't really care that much about it to muster any sort of complaint. Not everyone is a squadron leader.

Takeoff was uneventful and we were shortly on course to hit Sand Island by about 1400 hrs. It was a fairly long flight but since we could cruise in thin air and at relatively high speed, we wouldn't run into any real trouble.

"Well, Edge," I broke the silence after about an hour or so, "How's it feel to be done with Advanced Flight School?"

"I feel relieved honestly," she chuckled back, "I'm ready to get my first real assignment and work, instead of the endless training."

"Amen to that," I replied as I glanced out over my right shoulder at the edge of the Bennion sea which would eventually open up to the Ceres ocean past the Eaglin Straits. Cranston was only a little ways further water was a dark, vibrant blue, shimmering as the sun rose over our backs working its way towards high noon. It was odd being back here. It felt alien despite being a place I had been so many times before. "What do you think Sand Island is gonna be like?"

"Are you asking if I think it's going to be like the rumors say it is?"

"Straight to the point, I see."

"Come on, you can't tell me you haven't heard about Sand Island. Everyone has some horror story about it."

"I have, I have," I replied back tersely, "I've heard more than I need to hear. Even though I trust Steiner and Butler, why would they send us into something like the blender of Sand Island, I don't know. It's above my pay grade."

"If I had to guess it's Bartlett," Edge responded back as she waggled her Tiger's wings idly off at my 8 o'clock, "They talked about him like he was an old friend."

"Well, they could've been in the Belkan War together. It really wasn't that long ago. It sure as hell seems like a lifetime ago."

"True…Blood bonds people together better than a lot of other things, unfortunately."

"Hopefully we don't have to find that out for ourselves."

After that, Edge and I kept out of conversation, and contented ourselves with sightseeing. Over the plains approaching Akerson Hill and Cape Landers, the lush, green farmlands went on almost as far as the eye could see. This was part of old Osea. McNealy AFB was further down south towards Basset Space Center. The Arkbird had its parts launched into orbit from Basset with SSTO shuttles. A lot of the active Air Force and Space Admin projects were all stationed out here. Partly due to the relatively undeveloped nature of Western Osea, but partly due to who was sitting directly across the water.

Edge and I hit the Ceres for the last run before we hit Sand Island. Only a few hundred miles across the water was the former Baba Yaga of Osea, Yuktobania. Tensions between the two countries had eased recently ever since the end of the Belkan War. Basset itself was a product of the newfound friendship between the two nations. It made me feel better, at least slightly, that I was coming to Sand Island in a time where it seemed nearly impossible that Yuktobania and Osea would go to war with each other. Both countries had their interests irrevocably, or at least seemingly irrevocably would be better to say, intertwined with each other. The Ulysses asteroid had united the different peoples. There seemed to be, for once, hope.

But the lingering doubt came from my father's conspicuous absence on leave. Usually he was only gone when something was horribly wrong with the world, and he had to personally stick his hands into the muck to make it right. Even though everyone else was blindly confident, my mind still was troubled. I couldn't put my finger on what it could be. My mind seemed to be drawn toward the chaos that still lingered in Usea after their seemingly never-ending wars, with the most recent leaving Erusea in a state of almost total destruction, which had been the product of another transcendentally talented ace pilot, Mobius 1. In pilot circles around the world, people were trying to argue whether Cipher or Mobius was better, and some even dared to say that they were perhaps the exact same person. To me, it didn't matter who they were. They were apart of our story no matter who were the faces behind the enigmatic names. They spurred us on to our own greatness.

After my lengthy daydream, Sand Island came into visual range on the horizon directly to our twelve o'clock.

The Sand Island tower contacted us before we even had a chance.

"This is Sand Island AFB, Osean aircraft on radar inbound vector 270, identify, over."

"Roger Sand Island, this is Charlie 16 actual, callsign Blaze, along with Charlie 7, callsign Edge, inbound from Heierlark AFB, transferring station, how copy over?"

"I copy you, Blaze, pull into holding pattern at angels 20 over the base. We have an live-fire exercise in progress at vector 240, ten miles out from your current position. They will stay in their quadrant, how are you on fuel, over?"

"Nowhere close to bingo, Sand Island. We can wait. Over and out."

 _A live fire exercise? What the hell are they up to?_

"Hey Edge?"

"What's up?"

"See if you can hear what's going on with that live fire exercise over the radio."

"Uh, okay, I'll see if I can find it….." While Edge tried to find the right frequency, we pulled into our holding pattern over the base. "I got it! Just a few to the left of standard, 2-5-0."

"Roger." And after some fiddling I got the sound coming in clear.

"Tower are you shitting me?! Can you confirm he's chasing me with live weapons?! I repeat, can you confirm?!"

 _Oh god._

"Uhhh, roger Wardog 7. Wardog 1 is loaded for bear and weapons hot. We're trying to get him to disengage but we can't get him to break off from his attack, over."

"This has to be some joke! You assholes are getting court-martialed in five minutes once they find out what the hell is going on up here!"

"Well, shoot back then! You've got your guns!" an older, gravelly voice cackled into the comms, "Are you just gonna sit there and take it, Mustang? Come on, fight back!"

"Kiss my ass, Heartbreak, I'm coming for you!"

I didn't even know what to say at this event playing out over my radio. My eyes were bulging forward out of their sockets in terror.

 _A blue on blue. Right here, just spitting distance from Yuktobania._ _This is not going to end well._

"Edge, go back to the standard frequency, if they tell you land, do it. I'm gonna step in this furball."

"Roger…" Edge trailed off, "Be careful and don't get yourself killed."

"I'll be fine. Get yourself on the ground."

 _What a lie that is._

"Well, since I appear the only goddamn sane person in the air and on the ground around here, I'm going to save this kid's ass. Wardog 7, this is Charlie 16, callsign Blaze, I'm inbound."

"Charlie 16, this is Sand Island tower, do not engage, I repeat do not engage, over."

"Negative tower. This Blaze, I'm engaging Wardog 1."

"You don't know what you're doing," the gravelly voice finally replied back, "Get the hell out of here Charlie 16. This isn't your fight."

"It's my damn fight now, you made it mine since you're going to shoot down a goddamn friendly!"

I made visual contact with the two fighters, both in aggressor paint schemes off to my 11 o'clock low, the chasing plane, I assumed that was Wardog 1, was an F-4, in a dark woodland camo. The other plane being doggedly chased was a fellow F-5 Tiger II in light blue camo.

Even though I didn't have any missiles, I activated my missile targeting computer and changed the targeting system onto bore-sight mode, locking up the F-4 since it was the closest target on radar. I slowly descended on him from angels 20 down to angels 10 and got a good tone.

"Clear out Wardog 7," I growled over the radio.

The blue F-5 immediately jinked out and away over to my 9 o'clock heading straight back to the base.

"You wanna play this game?" Heartbreak sighed as he flew on straight for a few seconds, "Fine by me."

And with that the fight was back on.

And I was the target.

 _Just great. Wonderful work there Ross. You're going to be dead before you even set foot on Sand Island. Aren't Butler and Steiner going to be so proud of you?_

 _SHUT UP!_

Bartlett pulled back into a tight loop that forced me into evasive action to avoid his jet-wash and I immediately rolled my F-5 hard back after him to begin my pursuit. I knew I had to use the weight of the heavy F-4 against him by nailing him into a turning fight. So I positioned my aircraft just above him, ever so slowly forcing him down lower as he turned left and right and seemingly every which way in to try and force me off him. Eventually though Heartbreak rolled onto his belly and down into a Split-S. I had to cut him off at the end of his maneuver to prevent him from climbing, so I rolled and went into a vertical dive to force him to stay at low altitude. I didn't have much room for this maneuver. I had maybe 1,000 feet between myself and the ocean once I finished the maneuver.

Heartbreak quickly raced out of the way once he saw me coming to the right, and I barely managed to wrangle the F-5 out of the dive with about three to four hundred feet to spare. I turned back hard right as the woodland F-4 stormed back up to higher altitude. I gave chase but was quickly losing ground.

 _I can't stop him now._

"Not too shabby kid," Heartbreak sighed, "But not good enough."

The F-4 came screaming down at me after an Immelmann turn, and I could see his guns opening fire. I turned into him, screaming at the top of my lungs as I tried to ram the Phantom.

Yeah. I tried to ram him with my plane the first time I met him. Not that hard to believe now, is it?

Heartbreak seemed utterly shocked by my attack and only barely grazed my tail. When I stomped on the rudder to see if I had any damage, I noticed that the tail seemed to be discolored in yellow paint.

 _What? You can't be serious right now!_

"I'm not that crazy, Charlie 16," Heartbreak radioed as he leveled out his Phantom beside me off my right wing, "But you certainly earned your wings right there. Maybe some of those other nuggets down there can learn a lesson from that. You've still got a long way to go. Next time I won't let you push me around like that."

I had no response. I was internally fuming at what had happened.

 _They tricked a trainee into thinking he was in a live-fire exercise? What kind of clown-show is this?_

Once I got on the ground behind the formation of Heartbreak 1 and the trainees, I had to repress my urge to leap out of my plane and start battering whoever was flying that F-4. But once I did, I immediately chickened out. Because as soon as I saw him, I knew it was Bartlett.

Captain Jack Bartlett. The King of the Rooks. The man always appeared to be more of molded flesh than man, with a short cut of black and slightly greying hair on his head. He had eyes like a hawk, and you never, ever wanted to be on the receiving end of them. A lot of the trainees refused to even look at him when they all headed back inside. Bartlett had a scowl on his face as he picked out one of the fleeing trainees, a dark-tan skinned guy who I assumed was Mustang.

"You better get your shit in gear Mustang!" Bartlett howled, wagging a finger at him menacingly, "Next time you run away, you're gonna get transferred to fly transports! You copy?"

"Yes sir," Mustang replied as he slinked off back to the main building, most likely for the debrief. None of the ground crew seemed remotely phased by what had happened up there. It seemed like this sort of exercise protocol was normal. I decided not to raise any sort of complaints now. It just seemed like another nose to the grindstone sort of environment that I would be forced to shut up and survive.

Now, Bartlett was motioning for me to come over to him. I quickly headed over and stood at attention in front of him. He just laughed.

"You can knock it off with that sort of stuff around me. The other higher-ups you'll have to play obedient soldier too, but not me."

"Alright sir," I answered, relaxing my stance.

"So you're Ross Mitchell, eh?"

"Yes sir."

"Steiner had a lot of good things to say about you. Said you're one of the best he's seen in a long time."

"Well, sir, I'd rather let my flying tell you truth than boast about it."

Bartlett grunted in approval. "Well, you didn't do half bad up there today, but it wasn't good. It's starting point at least. Do you want to know why I pulled that stunt up there with Mustang?"

"Sure, I think any sane person would."

Bartlett chuckled for a moment, rubbing his chin with his right hand as he looked back over to the command building. "You're going to learn real fast I don't have many friends out here. Brass doesn't like what I do. They've kept me locked up out here for a long time, kept me at Captain for almost 15 years now. I try to do things rather than be somebody. It's what the old man would want us to do here since they destroyed everything else."

"The old man?"

"Roger Dowd. Shame no one knows who he is anymore."

"Somebody I know wanted me to say hello to him from them."

Bartlett glared at me in curiosity. This look seemed like a rare one coming from him. "Come by my office after you report in. I'll get you up to speed on the training protocol. You're not very behind, and you can catch up to everyone else quick. Just be ready to work your ass off."

"Affirmative."

Not a moment later, another Captain came up to me. His eyes looked cold and his uniform was perfectly in reg. This other Captain was the adjutant base commander, Allen C. Hamilton. He became the main liaison between the Base Commander and the pilots, for more reasons than one.

"Hamilton," Bartlett responded with a grunt as he headed off back to the command building.

"Bartlett," Hamilton responded without even a hint of emotion, "Follow me, Lieutenant."

I silently fell in behind him as we headed towards the command building, I assumed towards the BC's office. I quickly compartmentalized Bartlett's advice and prepared myself for another disciplinary shit-show. After a few minutes of walking through the sterile white halls of Sand Island, we reached wooden double doors, and Hamilton gestured for me to go in. I walked inside to a waiting room with a male secretary sitting at a desk, working away on a computer.

I stood in front of the desk and snapped to attention.

"Second Lieutenant, Ross Mitchell, reporting in," I stated flatly as I handed over my transfer papers.

The secretary looked up at me, took my papers and went back to his work, "Have a seat and the Colonel will be with you in a minute, Lieutenant."

I took my seat in one of the chairs, which looked like they belonged in a dining room rather than an office waiting room. I could vaguely hear voices from behind the door to the Base Commander's office, but there was nothing I was able to make out about the subject matter of the conversation.

I always had to prepare myself for these sorts of confrontations. They typically ended up being belligerent and heavily one sided in favor of the superior officer. As one could tell from my earlier encounters at Heierlark, I could only argue with the support of a sympathetic higher-up. If that wasn't possible, it was fairly miserable for me. I couldn't do anything because of my previous disciplinary record. Officers chasing stars were desperate to make an example of me for anything, and to my disappointment, the Base Commander at Sand Island would be one of the worst ones.

The door to the BC's office slammed open a couple of long minutes later, with Nagase storming out after giving a salute. I stood up as she walked past, and she didn't say anything to me or even look my way for that matter. Nagase seemed enraged.

 _Another first…What a place I find myself in. Everyone is going off the rails._

"The Colonel will see you now," the secretary said, not even looking up from his computer. He gestured towards the open door.

I silently gulped as I walked through the doorway into the office. It was gaudily furnished with expensive furniture and decorations. There was even some fancy nature painting on the wall to my left.

 _Way to flaunt your superiority there, bud._

The Colonel was not facing me, instead the back of his chair was towards me as I assumed he was looking out the windows to the base outside.

I didn't wait any longer to get the show over and done with.

"Second Lieutenant Ross Mitchell, reporting as instructed, sir!" I half-yelled as I locked into attention and gave a firm salute.

The Colonel's chair slowly whirred around to me, and it took all of my composure to not drop my stance in shock.

Orson Perrault was an obese man. There was no really arguing at all, his double chins, and massively oversized uniform was a disgrace to the integrity that every airman in the Air Force had to adhere to. Now I know it's rich coming from me talking about people following the rules, but this…person's behavior was such a blatant disregard for everything. I was shocked this guy still had a job. His dull green eyes glared angrily towards me, with a frown etched permanently into his face. He half-heartedly saluted back.

"At ease, Lieutenant," Perrault's raspy voice replied. I could tell he had my records in front of him, because of the relatively thick section of red paper of my transgressions from 'proper military behavior'. Of course that's what he went straight to, rather than anything good I'd done.

 _Gonna be a long day…_

"You've established quite the reputation for yourself, Mitchell. One minute you're the best pilot in the world and the next you're no better that a drunk bar-fly."

I didn't reply.

Perrault continued without missing a beat, "You see Lieutenant, your protection is gone now. No more friendly faces to protect you, you're on _my_ turf now. When Colonel Orson Perrault tells you to do something, you do it. No questions, no bickering, nothing. I expect everyone to make up a tight ship around here. We're on the front lines here. I don't want anyone displaying poor behavior. You make one mistake, one slip-up that embarrasses the service and everyone here, and you're gone, is that clear?"

 _Wow. He's one to talk about being an embarrassment to the service. This guy couldn't fit in an aircraft if he tried. They probably have to get a C-5 just to ship him around._

"Affirmative sir," I replied quickly.

"Now, it says here that you've got Yuktobanian ties, is that correct?"

"Yes sir."

"Now, I don't know why they'd let any of your kind anywhere near our military, because as far as I'm concerned you're just another danger to everyone. You're probably just a sleeper agent ready to start trouble as soon as trouble break out, am I right?" I refused to answer. I knew if I answered now, I would give an answer that would land me in a lot of trouble. "I want an answer Lieutenant. Are you a Yuktobanian spy? Are you here to sabotage our operations?"

 _Oh, screw it. This guy is just going to bust me no matter what._

I glared down at him, "Negative, sir. If I was, I would do anything in my power to not end up here, sir."

He scowled for a moment and then waved me off, "You're dismissed Lieutenant, you'll get your assignment information from Captain Hamilton."

"Yes sir," I answered, "Good afternoon, sir!"

I snapped my heels, saluted, pivoted and walked out of there as fast as I could. Hamilton was already waiting for me. He handed over my papers and other things for my room assignments and operational requirements. I was instructed to report in to Bartlett again to get more info. His office was a ways back down the hall I came over on the left. His office door had none of the fancy wood or prominence of Perrault's office. I knocked on the white painted door and Bartlett's voice quickly came through.

"Come in."

I opened the door to find a simple and small office, no bigger than a quarter of Perrault's office space. Bartlett looked up to me and gave a little grin. "Mitchell."

"Captain."

"Had a fun encounter with the boss?" Bartlett chuckled as he gestured for me to take a seat across from him.

I glanced back towards the door, and glared at the floor for a few seconds. I leaned in and whispered, "How does that guy have a job?"

Bartlett cocked his head, and his grin grew larger, "Don't ask me, Mitchell, it's above my pay grade to even begin to understand the bullshit decisions that command makes about this hellhole. But let's get you up to speed. I already briefed your fellow newcomer, Lieutenant Nagase, so let's get down to business."

"Alright, Captain."

* * *

Bartlett was right. This training was a shove off the deep end. Nagase and I had to catch up on a week of on the ground "class-work" which was mainly just a refresher course on a lot of the flying and airflow mechanics we studied at the academy. I finished my work in a few nights and quickly got cleared to begin in air exercises with Nagase finishing a day or two after me.

Bartlett's quiet demeanor that I had experienced the first day at the Island quickly faded. I was now a target of equal opportunity for his berating and insults. Although I would argue they were fairly productive criticisms.

The most interesting part of the whole training program was something that Bartlett had dubbed "The Battle Tower". Describing it in the most basic terms, it was a class ranking system. Each of the thirty trainees in the program were ranked on their classwork and their in-air dogfighting performances, and would combine to an evaluation score with a maximum score being a one hundred. I started off at about rank 24, which I didn't complain about. The interesting part of the program was that every other day you could declare who you wanted to challenge in the dogfighting training, up to a maximum of five places above your ranking. If you won, you took the spot of the trainee you challenged.

You couldn't fight anyone below you unless you were challenged by them. The top-ranked trainee was forced to accept a challenge from someone in the top five, which changed frequently based on constant combat simulations run almost every day.

I quickly made my way up into the top five within two weeks. Nagase also tailed me fairly closely in the rankings, although she never tried to challenge me outright at the beginning.

It was during this furious race up the ladder that I became acquainted with a very familiar face at Sand Island, the mechanic and possible wizard that everyone knew as Pops…

* * *

—July 15, 2010—

One day during combat training, I was forced to land early because of a random targeting computer malfunction. Of course, an early landing usually sent the ground crews into emergency stations, but this time a medium-height, balding man sent most of them back inside the hangars, wiping his hands on a dirty red rag as I parked my now blue aggressor painted F-5 on the flight line. I popped the canopy and glanced over to Second Lieutenant Peter N. Beagle, who was squinting up towards me as he and another crewman latched a ladder onto the side of the Tiger II so I could get out.

"What seems to be the problem, Ross?" Pops asked as he busied himself looking over the nose of the aircraft, seemingly already sniffing out the cause of the malfunction. The old man had a sixth sense for it.

"Targeting computer glitch," I responded as I hopped out and some more ground crew came rushing out and Pops gestured them to come over as he quietly explained what they were going to do.

"Are you seeing ghost targets or can't get anything to register?"

"It's not registering anything. I tried cycling through all the settings to see if I could get anything to work, but no joy."

"Well, it's going to take a minute, so come on inside the hangar," Pops replied as I followed him inside, taking off my flight helmet. I glanced around at the fleet of aircraft Pops' crew was working on, and several of them were almost completely disassembled.

"How many times are you going to rebuild these things?"

Pops chuckled as he led me over to a bench and handed me a cold bottle of water, "Well, as long as you fly-boys keep putting all these hours on your airframes, we have to keep the old girls in tip-top shape."

"Fair enough," I replied as I let my head sag, my fatigue beginning to show a little bit.

Pops immediately noticed, "You a little worn out?"

"Yeah," I sighed, "I've been trying to keep up my physical conditioning and schedule by getting up early and working out for a while, but I guess that coupled with everything else is probably taking a little bit of a toll."

"You play sports in school?"

 _Sharp._

"Yeah, hockey. Could've gone professional, but here I am." I smirked half-heartedly as I downed the whole bottle of water in one efficient chug. I glared back out to the bright blue

A couple of moments later, two of the trainees' F-5s flew over the base. Buzzing everyone by maybe only a few hundred feet. They were dancing all over the place in a fairly intense dogfight.

"Chyort!" I shouted reflexively, "They're going at it up there!"

Pops simply nodded and looked back up to the twirling planes. "You speak Yuktobanian?"

"Yeah," I snorted, "I've already gotten a dressing down for my heritage."

"Hmm, Captain Bartlett used to have a lady friend of his that was over at Merska for a while. They had a falling out though."

"Guess that explains the callsign then."

Pops chuckled, "Yes, he certainly wears it like a badge of honor now."

"My mom used to be at Merska too," I interjected, "Before she defected."

Pops turned to me with a raised eyebrow, "Really?"

"She was a naval advisor, and eventually she tried to defect not too long before the end of the Cold War. My dad helped her and they fell for each other."

Pops was silent at my revelations. I had barely told anybody about it in the military besides snippets. He started asking me more questions about my past. Pops and I talked about it for a while until my plane's computer was fixed, in which I had covered almost anything. Pops never said anything disparaging about it the whole time. He just listened.

When I headed back to my plane to head back up, Pops stopped me.

"If you ever need help, just let me know, Ross. You're not alone in what you're struggling with. Trust me on that."

 _What? What does that mean? Is he…?_

Pops smiled as he could easily see the gears in my head turning to put two and two together. "Don't worry. There will be more conversations."

I nodded, still slightly confused. As I taxied away back to my combat training, I couldn't help but think about Pops' words.

 _What sort of a past does he keep secret?_

* * *

 **AN/: No long exposé this time around. Expect a new chapter fairly soon. And the first portion of it is going to be from a fairly different perspective for AC5. Get excited.**

 **Tschüss,**

 **Esquire 6.**


	6. Chapter 6

**AN/: A new chapter in a week?! Crazy, right? Anyway, my plan is to try and update at least once a week for a while, until I go out of the country for around a month. Hopefully I can do a little better than that, but I don't want to overpromise anything anymore. Also,**

 **Thank you** **to everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed so far. You guys are the reason I keep working and wrestling with this project. I'd love to hear from more of you!**

 **A special thanks to an old friend for helping create the new cover image!**

 **Anyways, enjoy the chapter!**

* * *

 _"It got more exciting with each war. I mean the planes were going faster than hell when I was flying a Mustang, but by the time I got to Nam, it scared the piss out of a lot of guys just to fly the damn jets at full speed. Let alone do it in combat."_

 _-Robin Olds_

Chapter 6: The Game Has Changed

* * *

 _The following section is excerpted from "Kings of Forgotten Realms", the memoirs of Yuktobanian Naval Aviator Vasily Apakidze, from the Osean edition, translated from Yuktobanian to Osean by Ross Mitchell and edited for publication by Albert Genette._

—July 30, 2010, ~15 nautical miles from Merska Air Base—

 _"_ _All flight crews, report to the briefing room immediately. Repeat, all flight crews, report to the briefing room immediately."_

My eyes quickly glanced towards the speaker spewing the noise in the grey, dull halls of the aircraft carrier's innards. In only a moment I was heading towards the briefing room, with a wingman in tow.

"I guess we get to finally figure out what the hell's going on, eh Vasya?" My number two, Captain Oleg Simonov, smirked. Oleg was a 5'10" meathead with the personality of a jester. As he talked, his breath was rank with the scent of his typical vice, chewing tobacco. Oleg smuggled it anywhere and everywhere he could.

"Sure Goncha," I smiled back Oleg, as he attempted to correct his poorly groomed and nearly out of regulation black hair, "At least this means action."

And action was a good thing.

At that time, I was the commander of the 1st Guards Shipborne Fighter Aviation Regiment, the oldest and most prestigious airborne carrier unit in the Yuktobanian navy. Our tub was the Admiral Nikolayev aircraft carrier, the first in the newer series of Ulyanovsk aircraft carriers, which were apart of the overall military escalation program Prime Minister Samanov unveiled in '91 along with the "Super Submaries". Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you view things, by 2010, only the Nikolayev had been built and made combat effective due to the official drawdown after the Cold War. The growing budget and maintenance costs of the Hrimfaxi and Scinfaxi, had increasingly drew money from other navy projects.

The two older Kuznetsov class carriers were still active, but they were the less envious postings due to their growing age and more frequent reliability issues. Of the five proposed Ulyanovsks, three were cancelled and the only other approved hull was still sitting in dry dock, slowly working its way to battle-ready outfitting in another two to three years. Naturally, this whole situation frustrated our naval aviators greatly, since the promised increasing air fleet size had been drastically diminished. Fighter slots became more and more scarce in peacetime, so a position with the 1st Guards, the only Guards ranked naval aviation regiment in the entire Yuktobanian navy, was a high honor.

Many of the 1st Guards' pilots were seasoned combat veterans of the border clashes before and after the end of the Cold War, although some were younger but highly rated pilots. Despite that inclusion, the total roster of active Sea Flanker pilots was very small. Only 25 Su-33 pilots were on call for the Nikolayev and with the same for the two Kuznetsov carriers. There were only 75 pilots who could call themselves the true interceptors over Yuktobania's waters.

As for myself, I had been serving the Yuktobanian navy for 25 years at the time, ever since my enlistment in the naval officers' corps at 18. I had always wanted to be a pilot in the navy, even from a very young age. Despite my family's non-military and relatively middle class background, I decided to join the military to find a brotherhood.

And I found one quickly.

I had been selected to be apart of the 1st Guards back when the unit was designated the 405th Naval Fighter Regiment on the old Admiral Tsanev carrier in the mid '80s, and took part in the bloody border clashes with Kaluga. During the Tyumen dispute in '86, part of the 405th, myself included, were attached to the Yuktobanian Air Force's 9th Air Division to attack the Republic of Kaluga's Air Force. We lost over eighty percent of our aircraft in the battle, but the Kalugan forces were wiped out to the last man. Of the 10 craft in our naval wing that went into battle, 3 survived. I was one of them. I claimed six kills during the course of the battle, although that amount was small in comparison to some of the surviving Air Force pilots who claimed astronomically higher amounts. My first taste of combat was bitter. I had lost good friends in Tyumen.

The three Seabirds of Tyumen were then divided. I was kept in the regiment and promoted to squadron executive officer, one of the others, my old boss, was promoted to squadron command of the 405th, and then the last was promoted to command of the only other Naval Aviation Regiment at the time, the 97th.

As a result, I was already a Captain at 24. The squadron commander was a Colonel at 29. And with the 405th's change in designation to a Guards regiment due to "valorous actions above and beyond the call of duty" at Tyumen, we were now the premier Naval airborne unit. But we certainly did not look like it.

After our transfer to the Nikolayev in 1996, we became the troublemakers of the navy, especially after the retirement of my commander in 2002. The 1st Guards became a breeding ground for squadron tactics and training. Hot-shot troublemakers became dogfighting superstars with the 1st Guards. As for myself, I kept my head down and worked. By the time the Circum-Pacific War rolled around, I had already participated in or supervised twelve combat deployments with the Guards. And as our status grew, more pilots around the world began to know, and many came to fear, the _Серые соколы,_ the Grey Falcons.

After some walking, Oleg and I found ourselves at the front of the briefing room with the rest of the 1st Guards, who were joking and talking loudly. Behind us, the 293rd Regiment, who flew the Nikolayev's 20 Mig-29Ks, sat more subdued behind us, occasionally whispering something to among themselves, most likely a disparaging comment directed at the rowdier pilots towards the front of the room.

"Hey, _Chaynik_!" someone shouted behind me as I took my seat, "Turn your head, you're blasting light in all our faces!"

"At least a teapot doesn't have any hair to get reprimanded for!" I shouted back with several pilots erupting in laughter at my wisecrack.

After a few more minutes of messing around the ship's XO, Commander Dedov Tikhonovich, came into the room, orders in hand. Dedov inspired a lot of respect, since he looked more like a wrestler, despite his relatively short stature, than a naval officer. But his behavior and conduct was always top-notch. I never had any complaints with his work the entire time I served on the Nikolayev. He had almost invisible buzzed blonde hair and dark blue eyes that could scare any rowdy pilot straight if needed be.

The collected retinue of pilots snapped to attention at Dedov's entrance, eliciting a chuckle from the salty commander.

"At ease, everyone."

We all took our seats as Dedov took the podium and the room darkened, with a projector flashing to life a map of the Yuktobanian mainland on the screen behind Dedov.

"For those who heard the rumors that our long anchoring outside Merska is over, you may now believe them fully. We are leaving Merska effective immediately, on order from High Command, directly to Captain Grigory Tarasovich." A few pilots behind me could be heard exchanging money and verbal barbs over bets on our orders. It was a regular pastime. "Now, the next part."

The map quickly changed to the southern part of Yuktobania.

"We have a new deployment zone." A few red markers appeared in the seas surrounding the peninsula of the southernmost section of Yuktobania, nearing Verusa, one of our southern neighbors. "There is the possibility that this may escalate into a hot-zone, but we don't know for sure. Obviously, it's important enough to move us out of the the closest point to Osea, so assume what you will for now. All we know is that Verusa is experiencing some civil unrest and agitation, particularly, a new political opposition party has sprouted that has consistently threatened military action against Yuktobania for apparent violation of the G7 agreements. High command has asked us to help patrol the southern seas of Yuktobania, and be ready to assist the Verusan government if necessary."

Whispers and rumbling quickly broke out

"You think this is for real?"

"What the hell are we going to do down there?"

"Won't our presence just make things worse?"

"Of course, _we_ go south during the hottest part of the year."

"Quiet, quiet," Dedov half-barked as everyone simmered down. "I know this may not be the most wonderful assignment in the world, but we have a job to do. We're going to do the best job we can no matter what. That's what we signed up for. Correct?"

"Correct!" we all shouted back.

"That's more like it," Dedov grinned, "Alright, naturally that leads us to what the immediate tasking for you lot is. 1st Guards!"

"Da!" We all shouted.

"You're going to be our air cover on the way to Verusa. We will be underway soon, so Lieutenant Colonel Apakidze and his wing will start us off and the rest of you will rotate in four ship elements once you run low on fuel. As for the 293rd, you'll be on standby. We want you ready for any escalation that may occur while we are on station. Everything clear?"

"Da, sir!" We retorted.

"Good, everyone to your stations!"

My wing hurried out the door to head to our lockers to grab our flight gear. My wing at the time was made up of probably the best three pilots I had the privilege to fly with.

Of course, my number two was Oleg.

My number three was Lieutenant Yuliana Ilyanovichna, a bright blonde haired 25-year-old with the heart of a fighter. She was one of the 'babies' of the regiment, being the second youngest member of the regiment at the time. As my second element commander, Yulia did an outstanding job, day-in and day-out, no matter what the assignment was. Yulia never complained about anything and if she had combat experience, I wouldn't have hesitated in considering her as my number two. But alas, Oleg had more experience and was solid in combat.

The tail of our four ship wing was another Lieutenant, Urolev Pavlovich. Uro was a quiet, lanky 28-year-old who was the most recent transfer to the 1st Guards after a glowing recommendation from his commander on the Admiral Tsanev. Uro seemed caught up in the whirlwind of military life and the beginning of his new family life with the birth of his son about six months prior. Fortunately, he was home when his son was born. But, we had quite the party back on the Nikolayev when he returned. A fairly normal brown-haired and brown eyed individual, Uro didn't do much to stand out from the crowd on land, but in the air…well, that was another story.

After putting on our flight suits, g-suits, and survival gear, the four of us all stormed up the stairs to the flight deck to our Flankers.

Once outside, we were all hit with the strong smell of salt in the hot and humid summer air, with the sun rising directly across from us to start another day on the high seas. Our four Flankers were parked behind the island of the Nikolayev, with mine being the first in the row. As I did a quick walk around of my fighter, the ground crew was already busy loading our fighters with R-73 short range and R-77 medium range air to air missiles.

Number 99. It was the Flanker I had flown for almost five years at the time, and fondly remains in my memory as one of my favorite fighters I ever flew. Beyond routine maintenance, I never had any issues with 99, and flying it felt more like an extension of my thoughts than anything else. I climbed up into the cockpit of 99, which was decked out in the light blue Yuktobanian splinter camouflage. As on every Su-33 in the 1st Guards, the left tail-wing was adorned with a Grey Falcon, our squadron namesake and mascot, earned from a shapeshifting Falcon in Yuktobanian folklore. As one of the crew chiefs helped me strap in, I turned on the electronics for the Flanker, and fastened on my oxygen mask to my helmet.

"Radio check, this is Sokoly 1, callsign Chaynik, over."

 _A callsign of teapot for a fighter pilot…probably sounds intimidating to anyone not Yuktobanian._

"Roger Sokoly 1, this is Sokoly 2, callsign Goncha, reporting in over."

"Sokoly 1, this is Sokoly 3, callsign Kostaka, reading you clearly, over."

"This is Sokoly 4, callsign Iskatel, I read you, Sokoly 1, over."

"Sokoly 1 reads you all loud and clear," I replied as the canopy to my Su-33 came down and closed firmly around me. "Deck commander, this is Sokoly 1, first wing is ready to begin takeoff preparations, over."

"Roger Sokoly 1, you are cleared for engine ignitions, over."

I fired my engines not a moment later and waited for one of the deck crew to begin waving me over to a launch position to the front of the ship. Once he received an all-clear, he began waving me forward, and I disengaged the brakes. The Sea Flanker lurched forward into motion as I applied right rudder to move towards a bow launching position. After I was away from the island, I folded down my Flanker's wings to flight positions. I parked my Flanker in a launch position facing the ramp at the bow as the landing gear was locked into place. I did one last flight surfaces check at the direction of the deck crew, and once I received a thumbs up, I gave one back and readied myself to throttle up for takeoff. I lowered my flaps into takeoff position and did a last look-over on all my radar systems.

"Sokoly 1, this is the Captain speaking," the gravelly voice of Captain Tarasovich, 'Iron Igor' as we all knew him by, crackled over my radio, "I wanted to wish you and your wing good luck as we begin our next deployment, over."

"Thank you sir, we won't let you down Captain, over." I replied back quickly. I looked over towards the front of the island as Oleg was locked in place in the launch position opposite of me on the starboard side of the Nikolayev.

The flight crew in front of us quickly cleared and moved to the side, as the main flight deck director motioned for us to throttle up.

I slowly increased engine power on the Flanker to afterburners, and I could feel the Flanker slightly lurching in the gear restraints, like a bull trying to burst out of a pen. A few more agonizing moments of waiting later, the call came.

"Sokoly 1, you are cleared to launch!"

The restraints dropped and the Flanker roared forward, using the power of its Saturn engines to accelerate rapidly across the deck up the bow ramp and into the air. Once off the deck, the Flanker sank slightly but quickly recovered altitude as I pulled hard back on the stick. My Flanker responded quickly to my inputs as I increased altitude to about 8,000 feet. I waited there in a circle holding pattern for the rest of my wing to catch up. Oleg wasn't far behind, while Yulia and Uro joining us not long after.

"Well, we couldn't ask for a better day for flying could we, sir?" Yulia said as we leveled out into a finger four formation facing due south.

"No we could not," I replied earnestly.

"Now, if we could just have a peaceful deployment, it'd be a hell of a dream…" Uro added, as he glanced off back towards the Nikolayev which was fully under power and rolling south.

"I'd like one of those too," Oleg interjected, as he pitched the wings of his Flanker in a lazy, small swerving pattern, "Peaceful deployments are good for my health and psyche. It's those nasty wars that screw with my head, right Chaynik?"

"Yeah, I know," I answered, "The last combat deployment you went crazy and started singing those pop records. I don't know if the scars have healed in my head from that one."

"Oh come on!" Oleg barked back, "I sing good! I thought I smashed it the other night!"

"That's what you think, Goncha," Yulia snidely remarked, "If you weren't making everyone's ears bleed, maybe then we'd consider otherwise."

"Whatever." Oleg resigned himself from the argument as we quietly continued our trek south.

Off of my left wing, the faint outlines of a small outline could be seen on the eastern horizon. That was Sand Island Air Force Base, the furthest western outpost of the Osean military. We hadn't had much trouble with them ever since the Nikolayev anchored outside Merska. We only had one run in a year back, which really could be classified as a rookie losing his bearings and coming a little too far into our territory. An easily forgivable mistake and an easily defused situation.

Little did I know what the future would hold in the coming months, and how it would be heavily intertwined with Sand Island…

* * *

—August 15, 2010 Sand Island AFB—

"Oh don't tell me they looked through my rock n' roll records again!"

How could I forget to talk about Chopper.

Chopper was…special, to put it in simple terms.

We met almost by accident one day, after he was roaming the halls of the base looking for someone who would help him.

And by "help", he meant give an opinion on a certain rock song. And after a long argument on the merits and elements of rock music, Chopper and I became fast friends. And to the superior officers of the base, the two of us became partners in crime.

Chopper, or Alvin H. Davenport which no one ever called him by, was a 29-year-old Sand Island prisoner. For his "unscrupulous and unprofessional" behavior, he had been permanently transferred to Sand Island and the Wardog squadron. Chopper only flew when the base allowed him to fly his mandatory minimum hours to keep up his active flight status. I had flown with him once and he wasn't too bad of a pilot. A bit rusty and a raw talent, but not horrible, and compared to a lot of the "experts" in my trainee class, Chopper could easily place himself into the top half of the class if he wanted to.

But Chopper rarely wanted to put in the effort. He spent almost all of his time on the ground, and often scheming.

Chopper was the first person I'd seen who had been allowed to keep a dog on base. I don't know how he did it, since as far as I knew he was fine, but I never asked why. I kept silent because having Kirk around was nice. It felt like there was finally a sympathetic mind who was willing to tag along with a pair of renegades.

Kirk was a rowdy black Labrador retriever with a heart of a saint. Despite being cooped up in Chopper's room most of the day, he never caused trouble and never really got upset. Chopper and Kirk seemed, at least to me, to be a good influence on each other, and everyone else for that matter. Kirk's calming and joyful presence had earned the hound immortality as the squadron insignia for Wardog.

Chopper's story is a crucial part of Wardog's, without him a lot of our successes would be impossible, even from the very beginning.

I had little idea of these facts as I stood in the doorway of Chopper's tiny room, much like mine, albeit with less boxes full of his "records".

"You think the Coast Guard guys ratted us out?"

"Nah man," Chopper reflexively waved the idea away, "They're good guys. Their officers may have found it, but I doubt they said it was us."

"Good," I snapped back, "Because we have a damn social tonight, and we better not cancel the damn thing. I've been looking forward to crappy alcohol for a week now."

"Patience, young grasshopper," Chopper laughed as he turned away from his cataloguing, "We'll get there." After a few minutes of looking through all of the boxes, Kirk walked over to Chopper and forced his head under his arms as the dog was clearly annoyed at his master's lack of attention towards his canine friend. "Alright, Kirk." Chopper got up and fetched a small bag of treats from behind his couch and threw a few to Kirk, who quickly devoured them almost before they hit the ground.

"Everything there?" I asked again, my impatience growing slightly, "We have to go now if we're going to meet Johan over at the gate."

"We're all good, my man," Chopper smiled as he gave me a slap on the shoulder as we headed out of the building. We walked along the back side of the base in the glaring sunshine over to the Coast Guard's outpost over on the east side of the base. There was only a chain link fence separating the two branches' bases from each other. Chopper and I walked up to a door in the fence and waited. If you had seen Chopper at that moment with his black hair styled in a Rockabilly haircut and long sideburns, you'd have sworn he was a guitar player in some band, not a pilot in the air force. He'd probably would've wished his fortunes had allowed for him to be on tour instead of on a military base doing a pseudo-covert deal for booze. But sometimes, that's just how things end up.

After a few minutes, a medium height Coast Guard sailor came up to the fence door with two plastic shopping bags filled to the brim with cans. He was wearing a brown baseball cap and never looked up as he opened the door, dropped the bags on our side, and took a handshake from Chopper which was a covert exchange to swap cash for the trouble of getting the stuff here.

"Nice doing business with you two," Johan smirked with a tip of his cap as he quickly walked away back to his post.

 _Looks like it was just a random search. At this point, I don't even know why I'd find that surprising._

Part of our deal with the coast guard guys was that they would get cans with no labels. Recently, much to our luck, one of the guys on their ship knew someone who lived on the small island that was to the east of Sand Island who could provide such cans without the labels. However, it was going to cost a little bit more than getting somebody to scrape the labels off. So we worked out a deal. The cash was the new sweetener in addition to the music that Chopper gave them regularly.

With the exchange finished, we turned back towards the base and buried the booze out in the sand under a tree over on the south side where nobody would ever bother to go look. We would conveniently hold our parties out over there, but everyone who came didn't bother to ask any questions. Having a night off was a god-send. Our commissary was utter garbage, so we couldn't buy any food or drinks worth a damn on the base, and Perrault had prohibited alcohol there too.

Anger for food and booze can drive even the most upright military members to creating schemes of ridiculous proportions.

Later that evening, once official operations were done for the day, Chopper and I hauled out his boom box and music along with some other small party snacks out to the beach where a lot of the other trainees were already waiting, a lot of them with their flight suit sleeves and tops tied down to their waists and wearing some sort of bleached white t-shirt due to the heat. The weather had actually somewhat cooperated with a nice breezy evening on the beach. That stench of burnt jet-fuel never really went away though. It was a constant reminder of where we were.

Even so, Sand Island almost didn't seem like a hell-hole for once.

Most of us just sat around chatting sipping our "bitter water", which it certainly was, or were playing catch with a beaten up football.

I sat on my own off away from the crowd of pilots with Kirk sitting next to me as Chopper was busy playing bartender.

"Hey Ross," a voice called out behind me.

I turned around and found Kei Nagase with a can of beer in hand. "Hey," I responded, "Come have a seat, the sand won't burn you to death anymore."

Kei chuckled as she took a seat next to me, "Well, it beats get yelled at anyway."

Bartlett had been particularly rough towards Nagase, much for the same reasons that I had brought up with Trisha previously. Although Nagase seemed to be making progress in that department, it was going to probably take the whole sixth months for her to really get herself out of that hole of self-doubt.

"How's things?" I asked as a took a long sip of my drink, "You doing alright?"

"Yeah, things are fine. It's hard to believe it's been here a month and a half since we've gotten here."

"I know. Honestly, it feels like it's been longer than that."

"And about 4 months to go…" Nagase trailed off as Chopper walked over towards us and Kirk dashed off towards him, kicking sand off of both of us.

"Ah damn," I groaned as I looked in my drink and found sand completely covering the opening of the can, "Gonna need a new water buddy!"

Chopper roared with laughter, "You should've seen your faces when the sand hit you!"

Nagase and I looked at each other and shook our heads as we stood back up.

"Yeah Chopper," Nagase smirked as she turned towards Chopper, "How would yours look if I threw this can at you right now?"

This was the first time I ever saw Chopper freeze in place.

"Uuhhhh," the motor-mouth mumbled as he struggled to get any sort of sound out of his mouth. And as Nagase brought her arm back to wind up for a throw, Chopper bolted. All the way back to the crowd he was screaming "She's crazy! She's crazy! Nagase's gonna finally kill me!"

This reaction sent most of the pilots into hysterical laughter, in no small part thanks to the alcoh…I mean "bitter water".

The par…I mean, the "socials" always ended at sundown since we couldn't build a fire or bring powered lights out on this side of the base. So the official end of festivities always gave us one last beautiful view of the sea with the sun setting in a shimmering orange haze over the endless waves.

After a few minutes, we all meandered back inside after discreetly removing our "waste". I went back to my room alone to read letters from Trisha and write back to her about everything that was going on.

I had actually won the top spot in the Battle Tower with the most anti-climatic battle ever. The first place trainee, a pilot with the callsign of "Aero" immediately messed up by stalling his plane by taking too tight of a turn in the beginning of the fight, and I could've flown like a dog and still downed him.

Honestly during that period in time, I had largely forgotten about all those military troubles and turned my attention back to my friends and family. I had felt a lot calmer about my future and way less stressed about results. Whether I finished at the top of my class or not didn't matter to me much anymore. What mattered was taking each step forward and making sure I made them stick.

Because in a little over a month, everything was about to go screaming down towards hell. And myself and a few of my friends were going to be pushed to the breaking point.

And then some.

* * *

 **AN/: Alright! So the stage is finally set for the descent into war for Sand Island and the first real taste of combat for Ross in Shorebirds next chapter. Six chapters is a lot of set up, but I think it all worked decently. Naturally, Vasya and the Grey Falcons will show up down the road quite a bit. Verusa will also play a role in the war too. When and where, I'll leave it to you all to guess. I'm so excited to finally get to the beginning of the combat for AC5. I know the buildup has been long, but hopefully, it'll all be worth it. I hope to see you all there!**

 **Bis später,**

 **Esquire 6.**


	7. Chapter 7

**AN/: Ladies and Gentlemen, the Circum-Pacific War with all its entrapments is finally upon us. Time for the chaos. Enjoy**

* * *

 _"There's a lot of Hollywood bullshit about flying. I mean, look at the movies about test pilots or fighter pilots who face imminent death. The controls are jammed or something really important has fallen off the plane, and these guys are talking like magpies; their lives are flashing past their eyes, and they're flailing around in the cockpit. It just doesn't happen. You don't have time to talk. You're too damn busy trying to get out of the problem you're in to talk or ricochet around the cockpit. Or think about what happened the night after your senior prom."_

 _-Brigadier General Robin Olds. King of the Wolfpack, and mastermind of Operation Bolo._

Chapter 7: Surviving First Contact

* * *

Did we have any idea of trouble before the twenty-third of September?

No. Not at all. If there was, we wouldn't have known because of the constant and usual bullshit we were dealing with.

Hang on…now that you mention it, something comes to mind. At the beginning of September, before everything went down, a mysterious wreck of a plane was wheeled into Sand Island under darkness. No one knows why it was brought in to Sand Island. It had Yuktobanian markings on it, but no one was really sure what it was. I had a nagging feeling Pops knew something about the situation, but I never asked him about it until much, much later.

My suspicions were naturally up. I was already wary of something happening and this was driving me crazy. After a few days and total silence though, my guard relaxed. A war seemed unlikely on my watch again.

Otherwise, things were normal. Lt. Colonel Ford, the "real" commander of Wardog squadron came in from the mainland for few hours on the fifteenth of September. He went on and on about following protocol and got fairly heated with Bartlett a few times. Apparently, word had gotten to Ford about the training exercise with the paintball cannons when I first arrived. Bartlett was about to get a reprimand when word came in that a reporter was coming to Sand Island to write an article about Wardog and the training program. Punishment would have to wait.

Of course that day was when the world turned upside down.

* * *

—September 23, 2010 Sand Island AFB—

I had gotten lucky, whether I wanted to admit it or not that day.

Due to the "unprecedented" nature of the visit by a member of the press, a whole change in schedule was made. Instead of wheeling out over the ocean for training, the exercises for the day were moved further inland. And more importantly, everyone was mobilized.

Well. Except for me. Myself, Chopper, and a few of the nugget airmen who hadn't even gotten their official wings yet who worked on the aircraft maintenance detail for Pops were put on official standby alert. If there were any incursions into our airspace, we were supposed to be ready to be airborne within 15 minutes. Chopper and myself as the only commissioned officers on standby, we were the Five-run alert team. Our planes were supposed to be held ready and waiting so we could be at our designated intercept points within five minutes. Of course, that's being a little optimistic with only F-5s, but I was going to do what I was told, for now.

I sat with the rest of the pilots in the ready room close to the hangars on the west side of the headquarters building. Wearing all of my gear and my G-suit made me fairly uncomfortable in my seat, and I anxiously would turn and twist ever so slightly every other minute or so. I didn't like being the one who was basically in charge of this sort of a deal with no combat experience. If something happened, I felt like we were going to be screwed, royally. But of course, Chopper was talking up a storm to the other airmen about some music of course.

As for myself, I thought about what sort of news story would even be here at Sand Island. Sand Island seemed wholly insignificant in the grand scheme of things. A forgotten training base where rebels' careers went to die and rookies got whipped into combat shape. The whole operation appeared unspectacular to a pilot like me, but to an outsider, perhaps there was something more. I hadn't seen Genette earlier, since they basically whisked him away into the air as soon as he arrived. They had armed the flights with live weapons apparently to show off a bit.

As it turned out, they were going to need it.

All of it.

At about 1045 hrs, the alert siren starting going off the hook. There was no brief in these situations. The only standing order was to haul ass.

"What the hell is going on Blaze?" Chopper yelled as he caught up in pace to my sprinting, somewhat.

"I don't have a damn clue, Chopper, why don't we shut up and do our jobs."

Chopper went silent at my suggestion as we hurried out to the hangars, with Chopper's and my F-5 already warm engines whirring in the early midday breeze. Everything seemed calm in the sky. Only a little cloud cover here and there and almost no breeze, which for Sand Island was unusual. We hopped in our Tiger II's and then were told to wait. I left my oxygen mask off as I stared at a base adjutant, some silver bar first-lieutenant who looked out of his element and shook.

"What the hell is going on! Do we have an intercept, lieutenant?" No response, he just glared up at me. The silver bar was dropping beads and beads of sweat down on the tarmac. "Lieutenant! We need a god-damn answer here!"

Nothing. He ran back off to the building as another officer came out and reiterated our orders to hold station.

"Shit, shit, shit!" I yelled as I smacked my fist into the metal covering above the instrument panel, "What the hell is happening out there?"

"Everyone got bounced!" Chopper yelled over to me, "Check your comms! Standard frequency!"

I gave Chopper a thumbs up as I switched my radio on.

To this day I wished I hadn't.

"There's ten bogies! I repeat ten bogies over Cape Landers! May day! May day!" A voice that sounded like Aero called out.

"I've got two on me!" one of the other instructors, Baker, called out in distress, breathing heavily, "I'm hit bad an-"

Static. We had a friendly down over Osean territory.

I ripped my helmet off in anger and started screaming at the officer that was blocking us, "We are losing people to unknown bogies over Landers! Let us go!"

"Hold your station, Lieutenant!"

"You cowardly bastard! More concerned over an international incident than our people! Pound sand dirt-bag, get out of my damn way!"

"I will cite you for insubordination, Mitchell!" the officer barked back.

I can not believe this.

"I dare you to!" I growled back, "This blood is on your hands, sir!"

I sat down, fuming as my attention went back to the radio.

"There's too many, I can't ke-"

Mustang was gone.

Then Cavalier.

Then Jive.

Then Barney.

Then Dingo.

Then Aero.

And then Bettson.

All gone.

I could only really hear Bartlett, Edge, and Svenson after that point, but Svenson sounded like he was in rough shape. He had both a wounded body and bird.

It wasn't for another fifteen minutes until we got a clearance to start moving. Pops was standing at the entrance to the hangar as we went out, looking just…sad and disappointed. Our gang of five was loaded with full air-to-air munitions, which was basically just a few extra sidewinders beyond our standard wingtip loading of the missiles. Again we were ordered to halt at the taxi-way. We waited a few more agonizing minutes until we were ordered to turn around and shut down.

As soon as my bird was parked and the engines were off, I was going on a rampage.

"Who the hell made these orders?! What kind of intruder intercept group never gets off the damn ground!" I screamed as I took my anger out on a lonely trash can as I picked it up over my head and smashed the tin can down on to the ground.

"Ross! Ross! Take it easy," Pops called over to me as Chopper followed quickly behind, "There's nothing you can do!"

"Nothing! Nothing!" I yelled back, "I could've done something if those assholes in that building would've let us go! Those bastards are just god-damn pencil pushers! They left all of them to die. Is that what we get from them, that when shit hits the fan we get screwed and abandoned?! No! Just no!"

"Ross!" Pops yelled back. It legitimately scared me back to reality. It was really the only time I ever heard Pops really raise his voice at anyone. What a wonderful honor I earned that day. "You need to control your temper. Yelling and throwing a fit right now is not the right thing to do. I guarantee you right now this is not the last time this is going to happen. You're going to get a shot at them, I guarantee it, and you need to be cool when you do. So please, for the love of God, take it down a notch, ok?"

My body grew increasingly more heavy by the passing second as I stooped over on my knees as I sucked in air that seemed to be fleeting from my lungs.

Breathe, bud. Just breathe.

I looked up to Pops and nodded quietly, defeated. The old mechanic gave me a soft pat on the back as he walked back to the entrance of the hangar, his eyes latched to the empty and still skies above.

"Guess people have hell to pay for, huh Blaze?" Chopper muttered quietly as he looked back to Pops.

"Yeah. I guess you could say that," I replied.

* * *

We lost Svenson too.

He crashed on landing and rolled the bird. He was stone cold dead before the F-5 exploded. He had almost made it, but his luck had just run out. I think everyone's stomach turned inside out when we watched it happen. I didn't envy the fire crews at all any more after that. I didn't want to even begin to imagine the possibility of them having to put out my shattered and smoldering remains.

Bartlett and Nagase.

That was it. Out of 11 pilots, only two came back. And we didn't bring down a single bandit in return. What a day.

But it continued. Bartlett was still the same after he got out of his F-4, with Genette holding his camera behind him. Bartlett was still berating Nagase about her flying.

"You keep flying like that you'll die real soon!" the grizzly captain yelled, gesturing towards Nagase with flight helmet clutched in hand.

"I won't die, sir."

That was her response. After all that.

This is going to be a long day…

Then the debrief happened. Speaking of chaos, this was the definition of it.

And then some.

Bartlett was going even crazier than I had, berating Hamilton and Perrault for the radar room giving a poor altitude reading and sending the nuggets straight into the fight with no instructor support. He went further and suggested that the radar operators deserved to be relieved of their positions for such an error. Perrault deflected any blame and put it instead squarely on Bartlett, claiming that his "self-proclaimed expert flying skills" seemed to amount to nothing in protecting the nuggets. Bartlett rightly took this as a personal slight and fired back that he wouldn't have been the one of the two left alive if Perrault let him have the training program he really wanted.

The barbs continued flying after that. It became more personal after every series of attacks. Beyond what I elaborated upon above, I don't think I can repeat a lot of what either side said that day. After a few more minutes of that hell, those of us who had been on stand-by got ordered to collect personal items of the deceased to ship home. Bartlett continued to face Perrault in the briefing room, alone.

This task remains to this day one of the hardest of any that serves in the military. It's a drive down memory lane where the neighbors are firing machine-guns full of memories right at you with armor-piercing rounds.

If it doesn't leave you raw when it's over, there's something wrong with you. I had the honor of packing up Svenson's and Baker's belongings. In all honesty, I thought the way things would've happened would find the reverse situation happening. Yet here I was.

Staring at the left-behind belongings of a dead man.

Svenson had little stuffed animals and pictures of his kids all over his locker. Many were life moments I'm sure he was unhappy he'd missed because of his job. Yet he stayed here and trained us. I could only imagine what it was going to be like for them when they got the visit.

That visit which we never wish upon anyone.

I…sorry. This is…a painful memory.

…

Baker didn't have nearly the amount of things that Svenson had. All that was there of any peculiar note was a silver coin. It was almost 140 years old, minted in 1871. There was a winged eagle clutching the Osean flag on the front, and the back was an inscription, "May we never forget their sacrifices".

I stared at that coin for a long time. It didn't feel right to chuck it away and back to ignominy. No one would really get the meaning as a civilian as to why that sat in his locker. So I quietly placed it on my locker shelf when I took Svenson's and Baker's duffel bags of belongings out. There was a line of paper cards in the hallway outside with a place for each of the fallen airmen. When I found the deceased instructors' spots, I placed their bags down and bowed my head.

I don't remember what I prayed for them, but I remember just hoping they were at peace.

"Go easy," I heard Chopper say a few spots down as he deposited Aero's and Mustang's belongings. He then looked over to me and nodded at me with a grim look.

I nodded back.

Go easy warriors. You earned it.

* * *

Classified and gag order. That was the final verdict. Command thought they could just shut us up and let it all blow over.

Bartlett called the remaining pilots into the briefing room a few minutes after the official announcement came down. When I headed in, the bleakness was just everywhere. Bartlett was sitting at the front of the room, zonked out with a dark five o'clock shadow from his fight with the base superiors. Nagase sat quietly at the front. She was now the most experienced trainee in the remaining class.

What a world this is.

But Chopper was still Chopper over on the left side of the room talking trash to the other airmen who seemed a little brighter and more upbeat afterwards. But Nagase was still quiet, the combat no doubt still raw on her mind. She didn't even seem to move beyond her hair ever so slightly fluttering from the A/C which which seemed to be roaring louder than usual.

After a minute or so, Bartlett groaned and lifted himself up to look over us. He grimaced just ever so slightly, but immediately it was back to business.

"I know you don't like this, but we're short on people. Starting tomorrow, all you nuggets are going to be sitting on alert. If we launch, stay glued to me up there. Nagase!"

Bartlett managed to startle her back to life. "Sir?"

"You'll be flying number two on my wing," Bartlett said, staring the young pilot down, "Gotta keep an eye on you, or who knows what you'll get yourself into. Davenport!"

I glanced over to Chopper who looked surprised. I wasn't.

"Me, sir?"

"Yeah you, you'll be flying number three. I know element command is a hard job, but you can do it. Just follow my orders and we'll be good."

"Yes, sir," Chopper grumbled to himself as he muttered some cursing under his breath that was barely audible to anyone.

"Mitchell!"

"Yes, sir!" I rattled back confidently.

"You'll be flying tail. It's the most exposed position, but if you can handle it like you have in training no far, you'll be fine."

"Affirmative, sir."

And with that, the orders had been divvied up. The rest of the airmen would be the secondary detachment. Bartlett dismissed us shortly after, and I went up to Nagase who was still stewing in her misery, glaring at the floor.

"Hey," I spoke quietly as I squatted down on my knees, "You doing ok?"

Nagase turned her head slightly towards me, not enough to make eye contact, but something. "I don't know."

"Look…Nagase," I sighed, "Whatever it means coming from me, I'm sorry. I know it's hard. I can't even begin to imagine what's going through your head right now. I heard some of the radio chatter and…"

"I know. It was bad wasn't it?"

"Just hearing it was hell. It probably was even worse seeing it. So, I'm sorry. If you need someone to talk to, you know where to find me. And don't be a stranger ok?"

Nagase finally gained back a little bit of a smile, "Sure. Thanks Ross. Hopefully this is all that happens."

"I'm praying right along with you for that. Trust me."

* * *

—September 24, 2010—

"At ease people, but don't get too comfortable. It's a grave situation for all of us right now. Let's get this briefing started."

Less than 24 hours after the debrief, already more trouble was brewing. The fat man was already annoying us with his "outstanding leadership" which of course meant leaving the briefing to the adjutant officer from ISR, or Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance.

It went something like this:

"Another aircraft of unknown origin has entered Osean Federation airspace. We have confirmed the target type as a strategic recon plane flying at very high altitude. Despite our repeated warnings, it continued to penetrate our ADEZ and was fired upon by Osean Coastal Defense Force SAMs. We believe one of our SAMs damaged the unknown plane, but did not destroy it. Radar shows that the aircraft is currently losing altitude, and is attempting to egress feet wet towards the ocean. Intercept this target and force it to land for identification. Do not fire upon this aircraft until further orders are transmitted."

We were dismissed shortly after and sent to do a final gear-up. I went to my locker and grabbed my flight helmet, adjusted it on my head and gave it a quick knock with my fist. After my G-suit was on, and as I was about to walk off, I noticed Baker's silver coin sitting there in my locker. I stared at it solemnly for a few moments and then made my mind up.

"Screw it," I said quietly as I picked up the coin and placed it in the breast pocket of my flight suit, "I'm not forgetting you guys."

I was the last one out of the locker room, following Chopper and Nagase out to our fighters. Pops was there as always, to help us all get ready.

"Ready to go, Ross?"

"Yeah," I half-heartedly replied as I climbed up into my Tiger and began my pre-flight checklist.

Pops just looked over silently and nodded as I sealed the canopy shut. We were loaded out again with a full air-to-air load out, all sidewinders. As much as I would've like to have carried AMRAAMs, the Tigers were too old to carry them. A full load for the cannon and a couple sidewinder missiles was all the old girl could manage. I didn't complain. It was better than going up unarmed.

"Formation cleared to taxi to runway, zero-nine, for immediate launch," the control tower barked into the radio, "Wardog lead, standby at runway for launch, over."

"Roger tower," Bartlett replied as our jets meandered down the taxi-way, "Alright nuggets, this is the real deal. Your training has all lead up to this moment. Stick with me, and we'll get through today."

It was deadly silent after that.

"Wardog squadron, you are cleared for immediate takeoff," the tower interjected into the void.

"Roger, this is Heartbreak One, taking off with formation, runway zero-nine, over."

We all throttled up to takeoff speed and began hurtling down the runway, the tires howling louder and louder as we increased speed. Bartlett's green F-4G leapt to the sky and we followed right after.

"Change vector to one-zero-eight. We are inbound to intercept point, over," Bartlett radioed to the command room.

"Roger Wardog, AWACS Thunderhead will take over once you're at Cape Landers, over."

My stomach was gurgling and churning every passing moment as our fighters roared towards the very same place that nine people died only the day before. My eyes were racing as I desperately tried to distract myself from what felt like going headfirst into a hurricane.

We hit the coast at Landers after a few minutes and followed it to the intercept point. Once we were about 10-15 miles out, Thunderhead formally introduced himself.

"Wardog squadron, this is AWACS Thunderhead, we will be providing support for this operation over."

"Roger, this is Wardog actual, callsign Heartbreak One, how long until the intercept over?"

"About three minutes, the aircraft has descended to about 5,000 feet and is still bleeding altitude, over."

"Roger Thunderhead, alright nuggets, you know the drill. Stay glued to me, and we'll all be good. No one fires unless I say so. Clear?"

"Wardog 2, Roger," Edge quickly responded.

"Wardog 3, Roger," Chopper replied.

And then it was silent. I was still trying to control my stomach and my brain from going wild. I had a feeling about who was operating the spy plane, and I didn't even want to accept the possibility it was Yuktobanian. I was losing my mind, albeit silently.

"Hellooo! Wardog 4? You better be tailing me, son!"

"Wardog 4, roger," I coughed out, "I'm at your six, sir."

"Good. Just keep it cool and we'll be home before you know it."

"Man, I'm glad you drew the short straw today, Blaze."

Oh, for the love of God, Chopper!

"Wardog 3, zip it! You better keep that big mouth of yours in-line, over."

"I'm sorry sir, but I refuse to acknowledge any other moniker except Chopper, sir."

"Well," Bartlett continued, "I've got my own name for you, but we'll see."

"Tally-ho!" I called, my eyes suddenly coming back to focus, "This is Wardog 4, I've got a visual on the UFO. Moving left to right, on the nose, he's heading due west, over."

"Roger, I see him," Bartlett radioed back, "Let's go roll out the welcoming committee."

The four of us turned as a formation to head after the plane, which grew larger and larger with every passing second in my canopy. As we got within a good visual range, my stomach dropped.

It was a Tu-160R. The Blackjack. It was the biggest and fastest bomber the Yuktobanian Air Force had. Although it didn't seem to be armed, seeing one of these in Osean airspace was definitely a cause for alarm.

What the hell are they thinking? Do they really believe they can just fly Blackjacks over Osea and not expect any trouble? Idiots!

As we closed in, Bartlett ordered "Motormouth Chopper" to issue the ultimatum. Turn back and land, or else. Of course it didn't really mean much because it looked like this Blackjack wasn't going to make it anywhere fast. The engines were badly damaged, and the left wing ailerons had a massive chunk missing. It was a miracle they had made it this far out.

"Well, looks like they're not complying." Bartlett sighed with disappointment. It was going to be another struggle, no doubt.

And then the other shoe dropped.

"Wardog lead, this is AWACS Thunderhead, we're picking up inbound radar signatures, fast-movers, fighters inbound vector two-eight-zero, can you confirm?"

I looked over to my screen and found four radar signatures back towards the way we had come from towards Sand Island. They had probably grounded the kids again.

"Can confirm, let's ride Wardog!" Bartlett ordered as we headed for a head on intercept, "Don't fire until I say so, nuggets."

We all click our mics back to the affirmative as we closed in. The intercept altitude led us straight into the grey cloud cover that was hovering at about 7,000 feet above the AO. As we closed in, I could faintly see the dark exhaust trails of the bandits. I gulped.

This is it. One wrong move and we all die.

"Stay close nuggets, this is gonna be tight!"

We were within one mile when shit started to hit the fan.

"Radar warning! Radar warning!" my plane started howling at me.

"Son of a bitch!" I yelled, "They have me locked!"

"Roger, Wardog 4," Bartlett calmly replied, "I think we all are, Kid."

And then the cannon fire started, which barely missed us as we roared past the group of four MiG-21s.

And so it begins.

"Wardog lead, request weapons hot, I repeat request weapons hot!" I called over the radio as I pitched my Tiger back hard into an Immelmann turn to try and get on the six of one of the bandits.

"Negative Wardog, negative! This is AWACS Thunderhead, Do not fire on the targets! I repeat, do not fire on the targets!"

"You gotta be kidding me!" I overheard Chopper moaning, with missile warnings going off in the background behind him, "These are not god-damn blanks they're shooting at me right now!"

I could hear Bartlett growling with frustration, he knew he had to disobey to keep us alive. And he didn't hesitate.

"All Wardog planes, fire back! I repeat, fire on the targets! No more of us are going to die today," Bartlett yelled.

"Hallelujah, Sweet Mary and Joseph!" I responded and I flipped my weapons systems to active, "Time to get some payback! Blaze, engaging."

"Heartbreak One, engaging."

"Edge, engaging."

"Chopper, engaging."

The fight was on now.

I sighted a MiG-21 ripe for the picking at my eleven o'clock low who was chasing after Chopper.

"Can someone clear my six?!" Chopper grunted as he turned hard to left, "This guy is getting a little too close for comfort."

"This is Blaze, I'm inbound," I responded tersely as I rolled and dived down after the MiG.

"Come on baby, come on…" I coaxed the targeting computer as I finally got into missile range, closing the distance on the enemy fighter who seemed to be completely ignorant to me tailing him.

The reticle finally locked on the Fishbed, "Good tone! Blaze, Fox 2!"

"Do not engage the targets Wardog! I repeat…"

Too late for that, Thunderhead.

The sidewinder flashed off my right wing in a ball of fire towards the fighter. Before the enemy had a chance to get out of the way, the missile impacted smack-dab in the middle of the fuselage, splitting the fighter in half and sending it tumbling down in a ball of the flames to the ocean.

I…I did it! No way, I really did it!

"This is Blaze, Splash one bandit!"

"Don't get cocky, there's still more of them out there, Kid!" Bartlett ordered back.

"Affirmative, I'm back on the hunt," I responded back as I picked up another Fishbed at my nine o'clock high. I rolled over into a High yo-yo turn to hopefully delay my ascent enough to pick up the tail of the fighter. This MiG was a bit more aware than the last and tried to turn into me to force me to break off. I did break my yo-yo turn, but I pulled up and rolled over, down into a Split-S which put me firmly on the MiG's six. I didn't wait to fire.

"Fox 2!" I called as the missile streaked off my left wing and smashed the MiG to pieces. "Splash two bandits!"

"Affirmative Kid, all four are down. Form up on me."

We loitered for a few seconds and then more bad news came in.

"Wardog, We've detected a second wave of fighters, five targets, inbound, same heading and altitude as last time."

"Roger, alright Wardog, same drill. Bring them down!" Bartlett ordered as we ascended back above the cloud cover.

The enemy was getting less confident about the four pilots being pushovers. This time the fighters were climbing up to meet us, and there was a new grey plane leading them. A Yakolvev 130, Yuktobania's top of the line training aircraft.

"Wardog 1, Fox 3, Fox 3!" Bartlett called as he let off his long-range missiles towards the bandits, which sent the fighters scrambling in every which direction, "Alright nuggets, engage at will!"

I throttled up immediately and rocketed towards the Yak-130, or 'Mitten', as our ID charts classified it. This guy was another level above the two Fishbed slouches. He was giving me a run for my money. In fact, in the first turn of the fight, He went High-G and got on my tail. And, he was already fairly close, maybe only a thousand feet off my tail.

"Warning radar lock! Warning radar lock!" Bitching-betty said in her monotone voice.

I know!

"Missile inbound!"

Damn!

I pulled the stick back to force my Tiger in a high-G loop back towards the Mitten, and as soon as I got my nose in his direction, with the missile having long overshot at that close of a range, I began firing my two 20mm cannons towards him. I tried to gain enough lead on the Mitten to try and lead him into a deflection shot, but the bastard was quick enough to get away and force me to climb again and readjust to get back on his tail.

"This is Edge, splash one."

All I could do was grunt in reply as I went back to the chase of the Yak, who was making himself be everywhere at once. He knew he had to get into a turning fight to get past my engine power advantage. But, I wasn't going to let him dictate the combat that easily. I pitched the nose up and disengaged, as I went hunting after one of the other lone Fishbeds who was slowly circling down at low altitude trying to get on Bartlett's tail. He wasn't doing that great of a job, to be honest. I went inverted and pulled into a high-angle dive, gaining speed all the way. The Mitten took this cue to chase after me, but soon he couldn't keep up, and was forced to try and take longer and longer pot-shots at me with his cannon. The MiG below didn't stand a chance as I locked him up and fired another sidewinder, which with the adding momentum of my dive, sucker-punched the Fishbed down into the sea in mere seconds.

"This is Blaze, Splash three."

"Damn Blaze, you're knocking them down!" Chopper called and then quickly grunted.

"Keep your head in the fight, Motormouth!" Bartlett cackled, "It ain't over yet! Keep it up Kid!"

I then quickly started scanning for the Yak, and found him circling directly across from me at my three o'clock. I rolled up into half-Immelmann-half yo-yo turn, that placed me inverted and diving on the Mitten as he tried to accelerate and turn back at me. This time I had a chance to get a deflection shot off with my cannon. I closed in, my window getting smaller and smaller as my speed increased exponentially. Finally, my cannon reticle was where I wanted it when I was maybe 1,200 feet out, I squeezed hard on the trigger, letting a salvo of hot 20mm lead fly towards the Yak. I blew past and could hear the rounds impacting the metal fuselage of the Mitten. I looked over my right shoulder to find the Mitten disabled and slowly descending down towards the ocean, and the pilot ejected not long after my pass.

"Blaze here, splash four, I repeat splash four."

"I've got this guy, if you'll let me have him," I heard Chopper radio out. I scanned the sky to find him and Bartlett chasing after the last flying MiG.

"Go ahead, he's all yours," Bartlett laughed as Chopper went after the MiG. This was a surreal moment. Chopper was chasing a real bandit, and Bartlett was essentially coaching him through the kill. It was weird to have a déjà vu from training, only to realize it was in real combat. Where we had killed people. Edge had formed up on my left wing, and I motioned to her to give either a thumbs up or thumbs down. She gave a thumbs up. She seemed to be laughing at Chopper and Bartlett's live exercise. After everything, at least she still could muster a smile and a laugh.

"The spy plane crashed, Heartbreak One," Thunderhead called as Chopper finally closed in to launch his sidewinder.

"Guess he was too tired to party then," Bartlett snidely remarked.

"Chopper, Fox 2!"

In the distance a little whit contrail flew towards the enemy MiG and exploded with a loud 'POP'.

"Hey, hey! I got him, splash one bandit!"

"Not bad, Motormouth!"

"Hey, it's Chopper, not Motormouth," Wardog's number 3 moaned as we all climbed back to formation above the clouds.

Bartlett ignored him as the most relieving message came through, "Wardog, this is Thunderhead, all targets have been destroyed, picture is clear. Return to base."

I let out one of the biggest sighs of relief I ever remember making. Instead of being scared shitless, I felt relaxed. Even though now, I had done exactly what the aggressors had done the same day before. We just whacked nine pilots out of the sky.

"This is Heartbreak One, everyone in one piece?"

"Affirmative," we all responded.

"Good, in honor of you all making it through that, you can keep your nicknames, from now on you'll be Motormouth and Kid, got it? Good."

And there it was. A name that stuck with me because Bartlett just subconsciously called me that. In the grand scheme of things, I could've ended up with a much worse nickname. Much, much worse.

When we returned back to Sand Island, our de-brief was surprisingly short. The IRS officer told us the whole op was going to be classified, again, and that Bartlett was ordered to Base Command. He was going to take all the flak for letting us open fire.

But either way, we all made it back. I went to bed that night no longer as a fresh nugget, but a combat veteran with four air-to-air combat kills, albeit classified. But, they were confirmed ones nonetheless. In some sense I was proud of that. When my number got called, even though I was scared, I made it work. I hadn't let anyone down; I didn't let anyone die. We had all kept each other alive through it.

And that encounter over Cape Landers would be only the beginning.

The beginning of a war that none of us could scarcely imagine the scale of.

* * *

 **AN/: So there it is. I've made some modifications to the dialogue due to some major breaches in radio protocol and to shake it up a little. I'm sorry I didn't post earlier in the day, but I still made it for today at least. I do plan on trying to update over the weekend, but for now, expect another chapter next week. At least if I make it over the weekend, it'll be a bonus. Anyways, please let me know what you think! I do appreciate everyone's comments and I'm glad people are happy with the pre-war developing of characters. It really makes it feel whole right from the get go.**

 _ **Bis später,**_

 _ **Esquire 6.**_


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